


You saved me

by obsessivewriter



Category: Being Human (UK)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Friends With Benefits, Friends to Lovers, George Sands/Nina Pickering minor, Ghosts, Graphic violence in later chapters, Mutual Pining, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Rewrite, Vampires, Werewolves, redeeming arc, reformed vampire
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:33:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 23,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25430935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/obsessivewriter/pseuds/obsessivewriter
Summary: Annie wouldn't think twice before throwing herself over a landmine to save others, especially the ones she loves, and so she wouldn't think twice doing whatever she can to help Mitchell retain his soul.Story rewritten and reposted from my original at ff.net
Relationships: John Mitchell/Annie Sawyer
Comments: 34
Kudos: 29





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> One of my biggest regrets as a fanfiction writer is having left two stories unfinished, but thanks to the talented @safaia and her AWOL WIP Challenge, I will be not only finishing this story, but rewriting it as well and posting it here. 
> 
> I know the fandom is pretty much dead, but even there is no one else around who still aches for Mitchell and Annie, I will be posting every Tuesday until the story is completed. 
> 
> Now, I have to admit re-reading my writing from almost ten years ago has been quite a shock. So bear that in mind. 
> 
> Thank you all in advance, in the chance there is still someone out there reading.

Waking up had never been a peaceful trance for Mitchell.

Maybe years before his recruitment, when he was just a boy and then a young man in Ireland, but that life had been far too dead and gone for those memories to be clear enough to trust. 

No, waking up had never been peaceful, even less since he got himself clean.

Coming out of deep sleep, when vertigo kicks in and the dream starts morphing into reality, was the absolute worst. 

Mitchell knew he did a bad thing. That much was clear, and the realization petrified him.

He stopped himself from opening his eyes and tried to avoid the habitual non-needed breath. In his throat, he could still feel the ache of the previous night's thirst. It hadn't happened suddenly, it had been steadily growing in the past weeks, and he could tell by how his hands shook every time he tried to light up a fag.

It all came to a halt the night before, with the stench from the ambulance arriving as he was leaving work: a carnage, one not caused by his kind, for a change. A train had derailed, and the smell of blood impregnated everything as he was leaving the hospital.

Mitchell had managed to get close to home, repeating mentally the steps left until he could get inside and lock the door and throw away the key.

_'Just three more blocks, just turn the corner, just get to the door.'_

He had been welcomed by a block party on that unusual warm night, and his head pounded by the thundering flow in their rich blue veins when he turned the corner. 

He had come this far to achieve humanity, and this was where he would lose it all. He was indeed someone else's toy, he thought with disdain.

His only balm was knowing that George wouldn't be there to see it all happen, as he was supposed to spend the night at Nina's, and Annie had taken to wander the streets at night. 

With some luck, she'd be away as well.

_'Three steps more and maybe I'll make it,'_ he dared wish, but in his blurred sight, he saw a figure coming his way; it was that heavy-set man from around the corner, who lived in the house with the chipped green paint. Mitchell panicked and sprinted the last two steps. A hand in a fingerless glove managed to fish for a key, but the tremors would never let it reach its slot. 

Everything was lost. 

He could feel fangs descending and eyes darkening with proverbial red. 

_'Oh God, forgive me,'_ he thought, and as he was about to turn, the door opened, and Annie's image broke the spell.

He didn't remember how, but he had made it inside.

Annie must have helped him, but right then, as he was stirring in his bed, he couldn't remember exactly how. Her face had been contorted with worry, that much he remembered. For a moment, Mitchell had thought that it was Annie who had been shaking him, trying to get him to snap out of his trance. He had looked down at his hands and noticed that it wasn't her, but him; his hands still shook, and he crumbled to the floor, taking her down.

Outside, the blood kept calling with its siren's song.

"Lock me away! Please! Don't let me do this!" he pleaded.

Annie must have been on her way out and decided to use the door at the last minute. She had always liked street fairs, the mess of the crowds making her forget she couldn't be seen. Mitchell knew it made her feel alive again, as she tried to pretend. 

Annie must have opened the door and find him there, and his eyes had yelled silently at her.

Mitchell didn't need to plead anymore. She took him upstairs, dragging him as well as she could, and she locked the door without letting go of him. She wouldn't have been able to do much to stop him if he finally gave in to the lust of blood. His fear flowed freely out of the fingertips, reaching out to her and letting it course into her own veins. The pure panic was so intense that for a moment, Mitchell wondered if her eyes were darkened as well. Annie let go with one hand, and he clamped his orphaned one on her arm, afraid to drown without her support. But her hand had just traveled up to his cheek, placing the full palm on his face to try to convey whatever peace she had left. Soon another hand followed, and she wrapped herself around the trembling vampire.

That had been the last thing Mitchell could remember up to that moment with his eyes tightly shut, afraid to face what he had done.

At last, when he had breathed in, there was no rust in the air, mocking him with the aftermath of his surely unforgivable deeds. Instead, the air was clean of the evil he feared. He was still in his room, and thank God, the demon in his flesh seemed to have been tamed. He dared open an eye, and the dim light from the window hurt his sensitive sight. He turned away before trying once more.

Annie was lying on his bed, facing away, and for the first time, she looked truly dead to him. He would have wailed if he didn't know better. She was there, as always, but gone was her eternal grey. In the twilight of the early hours, in the dull shadows of the Bristol morning, the nude skin of her back was a warm caramel, instead.

At last, the familiar stab of his crimes hollowed him. He had done the unthinkable, indeed. 

Just not what he had feared. Mitchell may not have spilled blood the previous night, but he had once again sullen what was pure and good.

Annie remained motionless and silent on his bed.

* * *

Annie had not fallen asleep. 

She hadn't been able since falling down the stairs. _'No, not fallen, pushed,'_ she had to remind herself. If Annie had to be truthful, she would have to say that she had never tried to sleep because she feared what would be like waking up to her dead reality. Annie was deadly scared of relieving that first realization of having died.

No, she had not fallen asleep after what happened with Mitchell the night before, but she had gone somewhere because time had passed without her knowledge. She had seemed to disappear from the Earth for a few moments or hours.

Something had pulled her from her trance. The soft movement of the mattress beneath her let her know that Mitchell was finally awake. She felt him sit up on the bed, and she feared that soon they'd have to talk about what had transpired, but words were furtive things she didn't seem to be able to catch just then.

The soft breeze from the open window made her aware of her nakedness. Annie felt drunk with the almost forgotten feeling of the bareness of her skin and mortified at the reminder that Mitchell was looking at her as vulnerable as she would ever be.

* * *

Mitchell couldn't form words. 

He looked at her unmovable back, and he felt ashamed and fearful to see her face. 

_'Please don't let her be tainted by me… Please don't let her eyes be swollen with sorrow and regret… Please don't let her be hollow… Please don't let her finally be truly dead and ghostly and devoid of the life she had stubbornly refused to give up on after her death,'_ he pleaded and begged to someone, or something he wasn't entirely sure existed, or if it did, Mitchell was more than sure would not listen to him.

* * *

It didn't take long for the memories of what had transpired to slowly flood both of their brains.

It was a portentous revelation of the power of Annie's touch: if Mitchell's demons could pour out of him and into her, she could as well pour herself back inside of him. The idea had clicked in her brain, all mad and magical at the same time.

Annie had placed her forehead on his and her hands on his neck. She made sure her body was flushed against his body, and she concentrated. Annie sang to Mitchell with her skin, and little by little, the fire started to recede, but it wasn't enough. Annie then rubbed his face with her cheek, and she placed small kisses on his jaw, and his ears, and she inhaled his hair, all smoke from his cigarettes, and life and pure him. Her nose traced soft patterns on his stubble, and all throughout, his eyes remained open and frightened on her. Before they knew it, the roles had reversed: He was, but a child scared to the bone of the dark, and she was as old as the Earth.

The need for contact grew as his eyes learned to trust her, still dark, still monster-like. Annie's lips had reached the corner of his mouth, and his bare fingers tried to dig into the flesh of the small of her back. She peeled the layers off of him to garner more area for their skins to touch, for her calmness to reach him. Her soft full lips soon ran out for places to kiss on his face but his lips.

Their mouths' contact didn't faze her; it was part of the healing ritual she was performing, making it up as she went. She had been busy focusing her energy to wonder why the cage of the clothing she died in was so easily shed. It would be many hours later that she would wonder about it, and how natural it all had been. Never before had she so easily stripped for someone else: lovers, doctors, and locker-room mates alike. It had always been awkward and clumsy, leaving her cheeks feeling aflame.

Once bare, she had covered him with her body, embraced the monster with her arms and her legs. Like a once-in-a-lifetime-blooming flower, she opened and swallowed him whole to keep safe. She saw a new fear in his eyes and reassured him with her own. 

"It's okay," her mouth hummed on his, and he felt blind in the dark despite his heightened senses. 

Mitchell fumbled blindly, surely more akin to his first time, more than a hundred years before, with a lass, whose name he couldn't remember. There was no finesse and no conscious thought, but replacing one hunger with another. 

Annie felt him enter her. He may have been the skilled century-old predator, but at that moment, it was she, with her very brief experience in comparison, who had to take the lead. Surely Mitchell knew how to seduce and touch a woman, even if just for the reward of her blood, but right then with her, he was but a nearly dead man finding water to calm his thirst.

The decision to give herself complete had been easy. Annie felt needed with an urgency she never felt before, and just like her tea, she gave her body and soul generously without so much of a second thought. Gone was her stoicism during sex. She moved against him as an equal, and she was vocal as she had never permitted herself to be. Annie felt the wave come as his fangs traced circles on the skin of her neck. Feeling the need to let him merge with her even more, she whispered permission in his ear, just like a substitute mother who wouldn't deny her breast to a crying infant suckle and self-soothe, sadly knowing that no life liquid would flow out. Mitchell's demons spilled from his fangs then, piercing her ghostly skin.

Some need, at last, was appeased, and his fangs retracted. Mitchell lifted his head to look at her, and at the consent that had been given. Neither of them was truly alive, but for a moment, what they were doing ceased to have anything to do with the sorrowful lives of vampires and ghosts. They were simply a woman and a man, joint in their search for pleasure.

When the wave finally broke for both, her eyes didn't close as they usually did. She rode that wave unapologetically, looking into Mitchell's human irises equally full of wonder and dread. Finally, both sets of eyes had closed, and Mitchell let her peace guide him to slumber, and she went into her trance.

* * *

At last, his chest exhaled the relief of the massacre avoided as Annie had allowed all of his darkness to take her instead. Mitchell feared the repercussions, he feared having killed her resilience and lovely naiveté, but he was grateful for the sacrifice she had performed. He would never be able to repay her for the gift she had given him: to retain his soul.

"Could… You turn around, please?" Annie said, finally breaking the silence.

Mitchell was relieved to hear her speak, and saddened by what he interpreted as her shame.

"Sure," he replied. "Annie, I'm… Jesus!" he fumbled with his words.

"It's fine," she interrupted, not ready to go there just yet. "I just need to put on my clothes."

Mitchell turned around and found himself smiling at the sweetness of her innocence, and thanking the abandoned God of his youth for that small mercy, that somehow had managed to make his non-beating heart bleed. Mitchell thought that it was so much like Annie to ask him to turn around to cover her nudity, after what he had seen.

After _where_ he had been.

The images and the sensations forever seared into the most inner tenderness of his chest.

And so, like Eve and Adam before them, they covered their bodies in silence, with the regret of knowing they had just been cast out of Paradise.

With his pants on and nothing more, and only once he deemed it was enough time for her, he stood and turned around. Her tank top and leggings were on again, and she was slipping the grey knitted boots back on.

"Listen, Annie. I'm so-," he started to say.

"Don't mention it," Annie interrupted him, standing up and circling the bed until she was at a safe distance.

"What you did last night. I would have… If not…," he tried once more, needing her to know that she had saved him and save them all.

"I know," she reiterated. "Don't beat yourself up for this."

Annie knew him too well, better perhaps than himself.

"It's just-," Mitchell attempted again.

"Shhh," Annie silenced him with her finger on his lips.

The slam of the front door and George's happy steps on the stairs interrupted their moment, and whatever it was that it would have led to.

"That's George," Annie said, looking startled. "I better go."

"Thank you," Mitchell said, trying to say more but finding only those words suitable. 

And without thinking, she replied, "Any time." 

Mitchell saw her cringe at her choice of words, and she disappeared embarrassed about their implication. 

If anything, he loved that, the way her blunder had brought them some sense of normalcy. 

It brought a smile to Mitchell's lips.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> George comes home with happy news, but his roommates are distracted trying to keep him from figuring out what happened the night before. After some tea, Annie and Mitchell finally have some time to speak about spending the night together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was meant to post this yesterday, but I got confused and I thought it was a different day, since time has ceased to have any meaning. 
> 
> So, this chapter reminded me how I used to write never-ending conversations. So, a lot of it is still there, but there is a bit more introspection.

Despite the lightness Annie's words had conjured, Mitchell still felt the weight of what had transpired between them the previous night, when George's light tapping on his door interrupted his thoughts. 

"Hey mate, are you busy?" he asked, peeking his head into the room. 

"What? No, of course not, you want to talk about something?" Mitchell replied, signalling for him to come into the room. 

He noticed George's improved demeanour, which was a stark contrast to his recent mopping. 

"Everything alright with Nina? You look content. Happy even."

"Yeah," George replied grinning. "I guess I am. We talked, and I think it's going to be okay."

The burden George had placed upon Nina had been heavy, and both he and Annie had worried for their friend. Of the three of them, George had always seemed the one with the better chance at being human.

"I'm glad, George," he said, tapping him on the back. 

George looked around for a moment, and Mitchell couldn't stop the uneasiness at his friend's innocent scrutiny of his room.

"Where's Annie? I didn't see her coming in." 

"Is she not in the kitchen?" Mitchell asked, feeling himself over gesturing and kicking himself internally for it.

George knitted his eyebrows and replied, "I don't think so, I didn't see her there. What were you doing anyway?" 

"Ah, nothing really. Having a bit of a lie-in," Mitchell said, looking back at the bed in disarray.

George stared at the bed as Mitchell pulled his attention to it, and he seemed to look at it a bit longer than he should have. 

His face then broke into a broad smile, and turning towards Mitchell again, he asked with a smirk, "Did you have somebody stay over?" 

Mitchell opened his mouth, but his brain was having trouble catching up and finding the right answer, though Annie chose that moment to rent-a-ghost into the room.

"Were you looking for me, George?" she asked, ignoring Mitchell. "I heard you call my name."

"Ah! Annie. I was wondering where you were. Did Mitchell keep you up all night?" George asked, with a teasing smile on his lips.

Annie felt suddenly faint, and moving her head rapidly between her two friends, she started speaking at a faster rate than usual, "What? Why? What did you say, Mitchell?" 

Mitchell raised his hands in the air and avoided both their eyes.

"Let's just back up," he said, trying to stop the misunderstanding before it caused everything to be up in the open before they had time to figure out precisely what had happened. "George, Annie doesn't sleep, remember?"

"It was a figure of speech!" George screeched.

He then turned to a nervous-looking Annie, and he said, "I'm sorry, Annie, I didn't mean it like that what I meant was that he probably bothered you all night with all that banging!" 

"Mitchell!" She yelled, livid at what she thought George meant.

"George, what the hell are you talking about?" Mitchell asked, worried, and trying to avoid Annie's murdering eyes.

"Well, it is obvious that you had someone stay over. This room is a mess! Did you see the lady in question, Annie?" He asked, bending over attracted by something slightly hidden under the bed.

Annie figured out what George was thinking and sighed, relieved, looking at Mitchell, who was giving her a tiny complicit smile.

"No! It's not messy…er than usual. It's always like this. What makes you think I had someone over?" Mitchell asked, turning back to George.

"Well, it is not the normal Mitchell mess. It's more the _'I had a fabulous shag'_ sort of disarray, and there's, of course, this little number over here," he said, picking up a small piece of grey cotton.

"Somebody seems to have left her knickers behind. Unless there is some news, you've meant to tell us. I guess these pants could fit you."

It was now Mitchell's turn to be livid.

"No, I don't! Give me that!" 

He ripped the offending garment from his hands and stuffed it in his pocket. Annie was looking away, trying to conceal her absolute panic.

"Oh, Mitchell! Such a gentleman! Somewhere down the street is a poor girl doing the walk of shame in last night's clothes and no knickers!" George said, barely containing his laughter.

"How can you say that to Annie!" Mitchell was visibly upset as he got closer to George.

"I beg your pardon?" Said his friend, confused as Annie yelled, horrified.

"Mitchell!

"I mean," the vampire stuttered as his hand was going through his hair, trying to backpedal. "I mean, Annie has to wear the same clothes all the time. Stop being insensitive!" He finally said, feigning indignity.

"I'm sorry, Annie," George said to her.

"It's okay. Don't mention it," Annie said, relieved once more.

"I was just trying to make a joke. I don't know why you are both so gloomy today when I am _ecstatic_."

"I guess you had sex then," Mitchell intervened, shrugging. "You are only this giddy when you do."

"Yes, and it normally doesn't last long," Annie added with a nod. 

"What? The giddiness or George?" Mitchell asked, entertained now that the tables were turned. "I guess that would be a question for Nina."

Annie couldn't stop herself from giggling.

"See! You are always teasing me about it, and when I do it to you, you act all offended! But now that you have turned it back at me, it's all shits and giggles!"

"It's all in good fun, mate!" Mitchell said, trying to sound serious, but failing miserably.

George stared at his friend for a while, and once Mitchell turned with hands in the air, he noticed something new. 

"Wait! What's that on your back?"

"What do you mean?" Mitchell asked as he turned a little, trying to get a glance of his back in the mirror. 

Annie felt her mortification rising again when fresh red marks were displayed on Mitchell's pasty skin. She couldn't do anything but look down to the floor, hoping George wouldn't catch on her embarrassment. 

"You got yourself a _feisty_ one!" 

It was George's turn to tease. 

Annie didn't miss the slight smug lopsided grin in Mitchell's face.

"What is it with you men and comparing notes of your sexual adventures?!" Annie yelled. "And it's not about you making the women _happy_ , it's just who's better at it!"

"Oh, Annie," George exclaimed, scratching the back of his neck and grimacing. "I'm sorry. It was very insensitive of me to talk about my and Mitchell's sex like when you…" 

"When I _what_?" Annie yelled, walking menacingly to George.

"When, it's been a _while,_ right?" He asked with uncertainty.

"George!" both Mitchell and Annie yelled in unison.

"I'm sure you have your… _needs_. I don't know if ghosts get PMT, but lately, you make me think ghost ovulation is possible. That reminds me, Mitchell, can ghosts have sex?"

Mitchell doubled over in a nervous coughing fit.

Annie groaned loudly and said, "I really can't take this anymore. I'm not talking about _my sex life_ in front of you!"

Both men stared at their friend speechless as she paced the room, her arms moving up and down, and ranted. 

"Of all the people that could have rented this place! Why, oh, why couldn't I have gotten a fairy and a witch? It could have been corseted period dramas with Colin Firth 24/7! And I would never have to watch The Real Hustle!" she yelled as she stormed out of the bedroom.

"I'll be in the kitchen making tea and you can come when all the male stupidity wears off!" she ranted as she went down the stairs. "And I do not have PMT George, so don't even go there."

"Now you've done it," Mitchell said, putting on a shirt and leaving the room, making sure to pat George's back as he walked by.

"Though," he added, turning around right at the threshold. "Colin Firth in a corset. I'd watch it even if just for morbid curiosity."

* * *

Making tea was an art. 

It was also something that Annie's hands knew out of pure muscle memory. Her Nan had taught her when she was seven, and Annie could still feel the papery texture of her hands around hers, helping her pour it from her family heirloom teapot. Her Nan had promised her to give the teapot to her as a wedding present. 

She poured the first of the cups as she shook her head, there was no point letting her mind go to what-ifs. But still, that memory was better than thinking about what had happened in the last twelve hours. 

As she was pouring the second mug, both boys entered the kitchen with equal sheepish stares.

"Here you go, George, Mitchell," she said as she handed them the tea.

Annie hadn't been able to look Mitchell in the eye as she handed him the tea, and because of it, she hadn't noticed that he had kept his eyes cast down as well, but both had felt something electric as their fingers touched.

"I'm sorry, Annie," George interrupted her thoughts. "Really, I'll just stop talking about sex altogether," George declared, as he sat down at the table.

Annie didn't say anything, but she hugged him from behind, wrapping her soft hands around his neck, which made George beam.

"How's Nina?" Annie replied as she pulled away and came to sit next to her friend.

"Brilliant. I think we're good. _Really_ good as a matter of fact."

"I got the idea from all the giddiness," Annie said with a wide honest smile.

"How about you? How was the fair? I know you were planning to go and do your usual people-watching. You had it marked on the calendar and everything."

"Ah, it was," Annie replied, while she fidgeted with the objects on the table, trying to will herself to act natural, "okay."

"Really? That's it? Okay? You normally have so much more to say about it. You have all those observations about how people looked and what they were eating."

"They looked fine," she replied with a shrug. "Happy… Alive, I guess." Mitchell coughed up his tea nervously at the word. George looked back, suspiciously.

"I mean, they were all fantastic," Annie added with her silly smile, the one she put on when she tried to lie unsuccessfully.

"Oh, no, Annie!" George complained, shaking his head.

"What?!"

"If you are giving me that smile, it means that you have some sort of Annie shenanigans going on, and we'll be up to our eyeballs with you trying to play matchmaker with the neighbours or with a litter of stray cats for a week."

"First of all, George," Annie replied, crossing her arms over her chest, "My father's name is Frank Sawyer, not George Sands. And second, nothing is going on. No brilliant ideas, no projects, no nothing! Last night was just _boring_. People-watching was boring! Only that and _nothing_ else."

"Okay, once more. I'm sorry."

Annie felt a tug at her heart for the way George looked, sincerely concerned about making her feel bad. Yes, watching people live their lives around her bothered her. 

Worse.

It hurt deeply, but right then, she was not dealing with that particular heartache. She was doing her best to keep those thoughts at bay, wondering what happened between her and Mitchell. She did her best shoving it all in the room at the back of her mind, where everything that haunted her went. She just pushed this new thing there, and she slammed the door hard, but sitting in the kitchen of their little pink house, she could feel the shaking of that door, and she could almost see it in the corner of her eye, threatening to open wide and let everything spill out over their kitchen table.

She felt terrible at taking it out on George to distract herself, and to avoid their unsuspecting friend from finding out.

"Well, that's good," she finally said, dropping the issue when she noticed something sticking out of Mitchell's pocket and looked back at him horrified. He caught her stare and her not so subtle indication at it, while George was telling them something trivial.

"Are you _even_ listening?" George asked, annoyed at his friends.

"What? Yeah of course… Lovely weather," Mitchell said.

"What? I wasn't saying anything about the weather." 

George stood up, offended, and he turned around and opened the fridge to get milk for his tea. Mitchell took the opportunity to fumble with the pants and pass it to Annie who promptly stuffed it in her sleeve.

George groaned and slammed the fridge door as he said, "We're out of milk again! Couldn't anybody else bother to do the shop once in a while?" 

"Well, I'm dead," Annie deadpanned.

"I guess that is the last bit of giddy George," Mitchell joked, infuriating the man even more.

"Whatever! I'm going to have a shower," George said as he went upstairs, leaving Annie and Mitchell in awkward silence.

* * *

After hearing the upstairs bathroom door slam and the water running, Michell finally came to sit at the table, in the place George had vacated. He sipped his tea slowly and in between sips, he noticed Annie, playing with a loose thread of her grey cardigan. A sudden thought entered his mind, and he wondered about the loose thread. If Annie's clothes were the echo of who she thought herself to be while she was alive, or at least her last conscious memory of her identity, why was there a loose thread?

She kept fidgeting with it, pulling at it, and making it unravel. Mitchell wondered if it would all disintegrate if she continued drawing it out, and at the moment he wanted to set his hand on hers and make her relax, but he stopped himself and instead he made a tight fist. 

It was then that he cleared his throat and attempted a conversation.

"Annie, I'm really sorry. I shouldn't have..." he started to say.

"What? Spare the life of our neighbours?" Annie interrupted him, raising an eyebrow and finally turning towards him. 

"No! Of course, I'm glad they are all alive!"

"Good. Then there's nothing to worry about. No one got hurt."

"No one?" he asked in a transparent code.

"I'm alright," she said with a smile, making light of it. "Not a vampire and, wait, I _am_ dead, but the good news is you didn't do it." 

She had even placed two fingers on her neck in an exaggerated gesture of looking for a non-existent pulse.

"But I did do something, didn't I?" Mitchell asked, getting closer to her and holding at the sleeve of her grey cardigan.

" _We_ did something, Mitchell. Please don't start with the vampire guilt. I'm not in the mood," she said as she stood up to place the mugs in the sink.

"Annie, this is serious," she heard him say from the place where he was sitting. 

"It is. You needed something last night that I was happy to give. I was there to help you, and it was good to be able to save someone for once. It's nice to feel useful and," she explained as she continued washing the mugs, but then she took a moment, and continued, " _needed_."

"Annie," Mitchell spoke then, and Annie heard him pushing his chair back and standing up before he spoke right behind her. "You cannot define yourself by what you do for others. I don't want to do that to you." 

There was a twinge of fear in his voice now.

"It was a conscious decision, Mitchell," she said, turning around and leaning against the sink. "End of discussion."

"Fine," Mitchell said in defeat, letting his hands fall to his sides.

Annie didn't know what prompted her to speak then, but she said, "and it was good."

Mitchell's eyes shot up to look at her, and one of the corners of his mouth started curling ever so slightly.

"Was it?"

"No!" Annie yelled.

"No?" He asked, a little hurt.

"I mean, yes it was _bloody good,_ but that is not what I meant!"

Annie huffed, taking the bright marigold gloves from her hands and setting them next to the sink. Mitchell looked at her, pursing her lips as she was finding her words, and he made a mental effort to remain silent and let her say what she wanted.

"I meant that it was good to feel more in charge of myself, of my body," she said finally, with her hands moving in the air. "I was always so passive about everything in my life that I never really lived. I never even had a one-night stand. I was so _bloody_ naive!"

"That is not necessarily a bad thing," He said, brushing her hair behind her ear.

"And besides, it is good to know that the last person I've slept with is not a murderer," she said without thinking, but suddenly the implication became clear to her, and she turned to Mitchell with a horrified expression.

He looked pained, knowing her statement wasn't right, and he abruptly let go of her hair.

"I mean, _my_ murderer," she said, placing her hand on his arm trying to reassure him.

"Good save," Mitchell said with a sad smile.

Annie lowered herself until she was sitting against the kitchen cupboards, and Mitchell came to sit right next to her. They stayed like that for a few minutes, neither of them speaking, but being painfully aware of the places where their shoulders touched.

"I don't think of you in that way," she finally said, trying to make him feel better.

"But that is what I _am_."

"That is what you _were_ ," she countered. "And thanks to me, that is still in your past."

"Yes, and I will be forever grateful for it. I really am," Mitchell spoke, turning his face towards her and leaning in a bit. 

Feeling Mitchell so close that his breath caressed her cheek was so overwhelming that Annie had to lighten the mood.

"On the other hand," she said, "I'm the _slag_ without pants."

That made him laugh.

"You, Annie Sawyer," he said, taking her hand in his, "are no slag. And I should know. Those are not the pants of a slag."

"They're not?" she asked playfully.

"No, those are very nice. Very _you_ by the way," Mitchell said, pointing at her sleeve where the dark grey knickers were peeking out. They were cotton and simple. Boy-short cut with two pink lace vertical lines that ended in two tiny bows.

" _Very me_?" she asked with suspicion. "Because they're _grey_?"

"No! Because they are simple and comfortable, and feminine," he said, and then he looked down to her hand in his, "and _sexy_ without trying too hard."

Annie felt the ghost feeling of her heart rushing in the middle of her chest at his words. 

"Well, at least I don't have to live for eternity in the thong I was killed for," she said with a smile.

"No. These are much better," Mitchell added, kissing her forehead and standing up to leave her with her all-so-confusing thoughts, sitting on the floor of their kitchen.

Annie thought, maybe for the first time, that it was a good thing she didn't sleep at night while the boys did because she anticipated she'd have plenty of things to ponder upon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be honest, I never imagined anyone actually reading this, I was just determined to erase that horrible stain in my fanfiction writing, but I see someone you kudosing and even leaving a comment. I feel like thanking you but also apologizing because this one was of my first fics and I can see all that is wrong with it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> George starts to notice something in the way his flatmates act around each other, though they deny it. Annie continues to walk around Bristol during the night, thinking about her missed experiences when she witnesses an accident and the newly-dead try to take her with them through their doors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Life got chaotic, but I was able to clean up this chapter a bit. I will probably still do a few tweaks to it.

Despite nothing having changed between Mitchell and Annie, there was an unspoken boundary set when it came to the physicality of their interactions.

George noticed.

Everything was, seemingly, as it should be. They would laugh and tease, yet when in the past touching had not only been common, but an expected source of comfort, both Annie and Mitchell appeared to respect more of each other's personal space. It was something more for Mitchell to blame himself, as it had become clear that his actions had caused a rift. At first, he thought he imagined things, but it had become painfully apparent when watching telly together one night.

Mitchell was sitting to the right side of the sofa while George was on the left while Annie was busy in the kitchen, the dings and clangs coming there, making both boys feel at home. Annie had then come carrying her trademark teacups and handed them over. George noticed Annie deliberately avoiding touching Michell's fingers when handing him his cup, and he seemed to have been doing the same. In contrast, in the past, Mitchell would have even pulled Annie down on his lap teasingly.

"What did you do to Annie?" George asked his friend, taking advantage of Annie having gone back to the kitchen to fetch a cup of her own, that she would keep on her hands and stirred with her spoon just for the sake of familiarity.

Mitchell worried at the question, but feigning innocence, he asked in response, "What do you mean?" 

"Well, obviously something happened because you both are acting strangely around each other."

"I don't know what you mean," Mitchell replied, knitting his eyebrows and turning back to the telly, "everything is perfectly normal between us." 

"Yeah, right.  _ That _ is how I know something is wrong. You are bot acting  _ too _ _ normal _ like you're following a script on how flatmates are supposed to interact with each other. No one has ever been  _ remotely _ normal in this house!"

Mitchell exhaled, knowing there was no way to get George to drop the issue.

"What does the supernatural have to do with any of this?" He asked with exasperation.

"Nothing! You really think the supernatural is the only thing keeping the household not normal? It's really embarrassing for you to be so naive at your old age."

"Your condescending tone never ceases to annoy me," Mitchell replied, taking a sip.

"Whatever," George said, shaking his head at Mitchell's defensiveness. "Now, spill, before she comes back."

"Everything is  _ fine _ , George." 

"Sure! Don't tell me," he replied with a shrug. "I'll wait for Annie to tell me what  _ you _ did."

"What _ I  _ did?" Mitchell asked, sitting up and narrowing his eyes.

"What are you boys talking about?" Annie interrupted as she approached with both hands wrapped around a large pink mug.

"Nothing," they both replied in unison.

George would have let it go if only Annie had sat in between her flatmates, but instead, she wedged herself between George and the arm of the sofa.

"Annie!" George wailed, his voice going a pitch far higher than what he had intended. 

"What? I'm just sitting down. Don't get your knickers in a bunch."

"Do you have to sit on me, though?" he asked while Mitchell watched half delighted at the friendly animosity.

"No! You're supposed to scoot over. Didn't anyone teach you manners?"

"Pot? Kettle? Ring any bells?" George asked her with his eyebrows as high as they could go on his forehead. "Sit next to Mitchell! There's  _ plenty _ of space there, you know? Are you now afraid of catching vampirism or, I don't know, some exotic strain of supernatural gonorrhoea?"

"I don't have STDs!" 

Now it was Mitchell's turn to have his voice raise a few octaves.

"Well, I don't understand why you're not sitting next to each other."

Annie started feeling a self-projected warmth on her cheeks, while she continued looking directly at Mitchell.

"Why do I have to sit in between you guys? I don't recall it being written down in the house rule book or something," Annie complained.

"Well, I want you to sit in the middle because at some point one of us is going to start cuddling with the person next to them and, no offence mate," he said looking at his friend, "I rather not cuddle with Mitchell."

"None taken, bro."

"Is that what we do?" Annie asked, worried.

"Yes Annie, that's what we do," George explained with his hands already in the air, doing the same ridiculous over-gesturing he always did when he was well into a rant. "I cuddle with you, or you cuddle with Mitchell, or you cuddle with both, but Mitchell and I  _ do not _ cuddle with each other."

"I seem to recall an exception the night we watch  _ The Notebook, _ " Annie replied, looking at her silver teaspoon stirring her tea slowly.

"We. Do. Not. Talk. About.  _ The Notebook _ ," Mitchell said, over-enunciating each word. "It was a long movie, and it was boring, and I was tired! I didn't know I had fallen asleep on George's shoulder!"

"That's exactly why we need Annie to sit in between us!" George added.

Annie groaned, and despite her annoyance, she said at last, "Okay fine! But you have to agree that there is something seriously sick about our house dynamics." 

"Well, add that to the list!" George replied. "Now, you kiss and make up with Mitchell so we can watch the film."

"I've already told you, George, we're not fighting!" Mitchell yelled with exasperation.

One of Annie's eyebrows shot up at the implication.

"Were you talking about me while I was in the kitchen, making  _ your _ tea?! What did he tell you?" Annie asked, turning to look at Mitchell.

"That apparently there's some… weirdness between us."

"Exhibit A: You avoiding Mitchell and treating him like a leper," George argued in his defence.

"I am not!" Annie protested.

"Why am I always the one with horrible diseases?" asked Mitchell.

"It's called a  _ figure of speech _ !" George explained.

"I think  _ everything _ is perfectly normal." Added Annie.

"Again, with the normality! Since when have we all been anything remotely similar to normal?"

"Okay, George, fine. I had just been overthinking about my interactions with you boys and thought that I had to take a step back. I know I'm too nosy, clingy and touchy-feely. I was trying to respect boundaries, as you are always reminding me."

"You are not, don't be silly, Annie," Mitchell argued.

"No, it's not. It's the truth," George commented, "but that is  _ who you are _ . I'm going to ignore the fact that you imply it's got anything to do about me when you don't seem to worry about my personal space but only Mitchell's."

"Fine!" Annie yelled, throwing her arms in the air, and moving to the middle of the sofa. "Look! I'm sitting down in the middle! And I'm holding Mitchell's hand, and I'm not catching syphilis!"

"Oi! I have feelings too! I'm not a leper, and I don't have STDs. Put the bloody movie on!"

* * *

A couple of nights after the movie fiasco, Annie had gone out at night to wander the streets and think. The boys had long started to accept it as another one of her idiosyncrasies, and they leave her be, though always reminding her to be careful. 

It sounded so idiotic to her since she was already dead.

But that was the perfect explanation of why wandering the streets of Bristol at night was so important. Annie had been so sheltered growing up, so caught up in the image of what she should be. She had never walked at night on her own because it was deemed too dangerous. The biggest joke was that her demise had come inside the safety of her own house. At night, in the deserted streets, she felt free and powerful. She could walk for miles thinking until dawn would find her and wake her from her reverie.

She was still ruminating the changing nature of her and Mitchell's relationship, as she walked the cobbled streets. She and Mitchell had always been best friends, closer than how she had been with George. Despite how much she cared for him, at first, he had been far from her biggest fan, and there had also been something drawing her closer to Mitchell, perhaps because both were dead.

Her relationship with Mitchell seemed the same, though they had not talked about what happened  _ that _ night again. Everything had gone back to the usual with the sole exception of physicality. Closeness was now painfully obvious to both, and their interactions seemed over thought and analyzed.

The first light of the day had not yet broken, but it loomed near when a sudden screeching of tires caught her attention. She was just in time to see the car crash against a pole. Annie ran instinctively to try to help the three figures inside slumped over. She had struggled with the broken door trying to open it until she noticed the absence of movements in the bodies inside. It was clear that it was too late to try to save them.

The thought had barely started to form inside her head when she felt someone pulling at her arm. She turned around to see the former occupants of the car in their ghost state. As she was about to start her explanation to calm them down and point them towards the next step in their journey, she realized they didn't seem confused or in need any help.

"You're quite a pretty thing, aren't you?" one of them asked in a way that unnerved her.

"Let go of my arm," she replied calmly but sternly.

"Aren't you going to guide us to our afterlife?" another one asked.

She saw the doors.

"Let me go!" Annie yelled when she knew what they intended to do.

"Oh! But we could have so much fun! I've heard you like to play hard to get," the male ghost said with a wink that made Annie's ghost skin cover in goosebumps. 

She was backing up as the three of them were tugging at her sleeves.

"Those are not my doors. You can't make me go!"

"Well dear, rumour has it you don't like  _ your door  _ so much."

Run. 

The word was being yelled inside her head.

"That's not where I belong!"

"Well,  _ this _ is not where you belong either, so you're coming with us."

The struggle was getting violent.

"Let me go!" she said, running and letting them keep the grey knitted cardigan.

"Oh, you can run Annie. But you're going to get caught! Has anyone  _ seen _ you lately? I've heard you used to work at a pub, but everyone started ignoring you!"

They knew how to get her attention. She turned slightly, still trying to get away.

"George and Mitchell can see me!" she yelled, trying to convince them as well as herself.

"Yes, but for how long?" one of the cruel men taunted her.

Annie didn't stay, but as she ran away, she could still hear them sneering at her.

"Are you feeling light, Annie?"

"You look a little pale, or is it see-through? One day they'll let go of your hand, and you're going to lift off like a helium balloon, and no one is going to catch you," another voice said.

"She'll be gone, gone, gone!"

Annie ran until she could barely hear their cackles behind her. Still, tears prickled her eyes and the fear caught in her throat.

By the time she reached Windsor Terrace, Annie was in a full-blown panic. She needed to find her boys and have them tell her those had been just lies. Though it was still dark, she could hear sounds from someone inside the house getting ready for work.

Unbeknownst to Annie, George had already left fr work, while Mitchell was coming out of the shower, and getting dressed. Annie's hand ghosted over the doorknob as she reached to grab it, and so she went through the door even more frightened.

She felt herself fading, as she ran up the stairs and attempted to call for her friends, but no sound came out of her mouth. Reaching the top, the momentum made her slam against the wall just as Mitchell came out of the bathroom. His eyes looked up, and they lined up with her own, Annie thought it would take a moment for him to take in the state of fear she was in, but very soon Mitchell's eyes looked down and he walked past her as if she was not there. 

Annie felt deep despair taking hold of her, yet, somehow, she got into Mitchell's room, lunging herself through the door. She landed on her knees and the scream she had been holding came out more violent that what she had expected. The resulting sound was a sad wail that made Mitchell turn and see her hit the floor. Mitchell got down immediately to gather her in his arms, with his hands going all over her arms and face, trying to find what was wrong with her. 

"Annie! Annie!"

She looked at him, and he was able to see the panic on her face. Her arms were bare, and he could notice impossible scratch marks on them. The sight made the borrowed blood in his veins boil.

"Tell me what happened? Who did this?" she heard him say as he started letting go to find the culprit with his jaw tense and his eyes black with rage.

"No! Don't leave me, please!" she pleaded.

"It's okay, sweetheart. I won't leave you," he said, holding her again and choosing to reassure her before revenge. "What happened?" 

It was hard for Mitchell to keep calm when he wanted to murder whoever had hurt her.

"They tried to take me," she said then in full hysterics.

"Who's they?" he asked, begging for a name. That's all he needed. 

"Some men in a car," she sobbed. "They crashed, and when I went to help them, they tried to pull me to their doors."

"Annie, listen, love, did they hurt you?" he said, reminding himself mentally to focus on Annie and not on her attackers.

"I'm alright, they pulled me and scratch me a little, but I'm okay. I'm not hurt. But they said..." 

Annie had to pause, as every time she remembered what the men said, she felt herself back there.

"What did they say?" Mitchell asked gently.

"I'm fading Mitchell! I'm going to disappear!" she sobbed, holding on to his shirt.

"No, no. They were lying, you're not going anywhere."

Mitchell's hands were brushing the curls off her face, and taking the time to caress her cheek as he did.

"They did, and they were right," she continued, still panicking. "I couldn't grab the handle, and  _ you _ didn't see me. You can't see me! George won't be able to see me." 

Mitchell only half understood what she was saying, but it was enough to understand her fear.

"I can see you, and I can hear you. Calm down, Annie, please!"

Mitchell held her tight and reached for the mobile in his back pocket to call George.

"George, mate. I need a favour," he said as soon as the call connected. "Yes, yes, it's Annie. She's fine now… I got her… Tell them I'm sick… She can't be alone right now. It's okay. Yes…Yes… No, I don't think you need to… Listen, I think she's going to need someone here all the time. We can't leave her alone… Better you stay at work now and then I'll switch my shift tomorrow… Okay mate, yes… I'll ring you. Bye."

Annie heard Mitchell talking with George. It was easy to fill in the gaps, and while the one-sided conversation made her feel helpless, she didn't feel the energy to intervene and say that she was okay and didn't need their worry. She could be strong later, right then she needed to feel solid, to know she was truly there and wouldn't be going away without anyone noticing. 

"Okay, Annie. I'm here, and I'm not going to leave. Calm down, darling."

"I'm fading, I can feel myself going away, and they are going to get me, Mitchell, they're mad at me for not going through my door."

Her tone was no longer desperate, but there was something sadder in her resigned tone, the softer wailing of a wounded animal, that made Mitchell's chest ache.

That was something else that was his fault, he thought.

The tears were running down her cheek, and it was only his fault because she had given up on her door for him.

"You're not disappearing, I can see you, love. I can see  _ you _ ." 

"But you couldn't  _ before _ , I was screaming, and you looked right through me, and you didn't hear me, I couldn't hear me either."

"I can feel you  _ now _ ," he said with both hands on the sides of her face, to make her see into his eyes as he spoke. "Focus on this Annie, look at me. I can see you. Can you feel my hands on your face? They can touch you and feel you. I can feel how soft your skin is."

He kissed her forehead then.

"Can you feel that?" He continued. "I kissed your forehead, and I felt it. Can you feel me? Can you really feel me?" he asked, looking for her eyes.

"I can," she replied with a bit more conviction.

Annie found her hope in him, and she desperately needed as much as she could get. She lunged forward into him, almost knocking him down.

She kissed him hard and poured all her desperation into the contact of their lips, as if performing an experiment, trying to gauge just how much she could feel and not worrying at all of the implications.

"Annie," he sighed, understanding her need.

"I want to  _ feel _ , Mitchell. I need to feel  _ something _ ."

Mitchell couldn't deny her anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mitchell does his best to convince Annie that she is not going to disappear after a scary encounter with ghosts who tried to pull her through their doors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took a couple of days extra to post because of some real-life issues, but here it is.

Her world was imploding. 

Bit by bit, gravity faded away, and every particle started floating, no longer tethered to the ground. Annie was sure that soon, brick by brick, her pink house would begin to come loose, rising through the air like a sky lantern. 

Yet, as she felt herself vanish, in the middle of Mitchell's room, the only thing solid where his hands and his steady voice. 

"I'm here, it's okay," he said against her skin. "Close your eyes. _Trust me_." 

Annie felt small like those nights at her Nan's place, hiding under the blankets and scared of the creaking sounds of the old house and the thunder outside. But she trusted Mitchell, hoping she could still go back to the time when she still believed in Father Christmas and the Easter egg bunny. 

Annie trusted him, at that precise moment she'd believe whatever he had to say, that fishes swam in the wind and fire was cold, as long as he convinced her she would not disappear.

"What am I doing, Annie?"

"Mitchell," she begged disoriented.

"Just tell me, Annie," he asked again, and despite the coldness of his own body, his breath so close to her face felt aflame. "Concentrate."

"You're running your hands down my arms," 

Closing her eyes, she allowed herself to feel something growing out of the ground beneath her.

"I am," he whispered next to her ear. "You can feel it, then. What am I doing now?"

His voice then became a distant mumble.

"You're kissing my neck."

If Annie felt before that every little thing not nailed down was about to start levitating with her, she didn't anymore. There was a pull then, of the earth claiming her. 

"And now?"

Still, with eyes closed, she replied, and later she would berate herself for sounding so eager, like she used to be in primary school, hungry for praise. "Your hand, it's under my shirt."

He hummed his approval, and her heart fluttered.

"And can you feel this?" a certain malice was curving up the corners of his mouth, invisible to her behind her closed lids, but she could hear it in his tone.

"You're… tickling me. No! Don't do that please!" A level of cheeriness was coming back to her, and he couldn't quite understand why it always made something in his chest grow warm and soft. There were some memories from his past, vague and distant, but he thought that the laughter in her voice made him feel like he did when he was a kid and sometimes he wanted to laugh and cry at the same time.

"It's okay, I'm not going to torture you. You felt it, though, right?" Mitchell asked, looking at her dark lashes flutter open. "Ah! Don't peek. I'll know if you're cheating."

His arms snaked around her waist and started pulling both from the ground as he kissed her slowly. Once they were standing, his right hand climbed to cradle her neck while the other closed tighter around her lower back. He didn't have to again, but she felt the solidity of his body, every muscle determined against her.

She was earthbound then; a sensual part of it all.

Mitchell broke the kiss and set his forehead against hers. As Annie opened her eyes, she was welcomed by the intensity of his stare.

"What did I tell you about those eyes?" he said, letting his hands slide down to grab the edge of her tank top and slowly lift it up until he freed her of it.

"Can you feel the cotton against your skin? Is it soft?"

"Yes," Annie replied as she made her hands go to the first button of this shirt.

"What are you doing?" 

Mitchell's words made her freeze and instinctively let go.

"No, I didn't say you should stop," he added, nuzzling her cheek with his nose. "I just want you to tell me what you're doing."

"I'm taking off your shirt," she answered.

"Can you feel the texture of the fabric?" He asked, and felt her merely nodding. "Tell me."

"I can feel it's old and worn."

"Hmm, it is."

Soon they had gone through the rest of the clothes, and with each item they took turns describing the sensations, every single one heightened by the need to put into words, to savour each one of them in their mouths and utter them against warm skin or tracing them with their tongues.

His hands went to her hips, and he nudged them to let him pick her up and have legs wrap around his torso instinctively. Mitchell walked effortlessly, carrying her while he kissed her until he leaned her against a wall. The open window was next to them, and even with eyes closed, Annie she could feel the draft. He parted from her just enough for his thumb to find a rapidly puckering nipple.

"Can you feel the cold coming from outside?"

His voice was deep, like a tremor shaking the earth.

"Yes," Annie sighed.

She had been caged all this time when she was something wild.

"Can you feel me touching you?"

"Yes!"

She didn't need him to remind her to keep her eyes closed anymore, and Mitchell took a moment to stare at her. He knew that he had to be the skilful lover he could be. All those years of anonymous bodies and forgettable mouths. All that fodder for that moment of delicious sacrifice.

Annie was the earth goddess he'd happily immolate himself to have her senses overwhelmed. 

He vowed to make her heart beat again if only for a few seconds.

If Annie was feeling lighter than air before, afraid of the earth losing its hold on her, she now felt so heavy and full. The air around them was thick and almost too much to bear. Her body ached with a primaeval need. Never before had she felt more alive or more human, with the grittiness and messiness of life, a life that wanted to expand and suffocate everything and everyone else left around.

Mitchell had done his job well. He could feel her near him, blooming and ready. Annie was pure instinct now; her body undulating and looking for relief. There was barely any space left between them, and her nipples moved against the soft down of hair on his chest. In between the valley of her breasts, Annie could feel Mitchell's silver ring, hanging cold and heavy from the chain around his neck.

Annie sensed herself becoming larger than everything around, she was almost sure soon she would be able to feel through Mitchell's skin and through every object in the room. Just as the subtle and constant movement of the world, their bodies were lining up to their rightful place.

She felt like the universe creating itself.

Her hands wandered without needing him to guide her with his words anymore; instead, he used his mouth to wrap itself around an eager breast.

In her blind search, she found him, and it took him every ounce of strength not to give in.

"Mitchell," Annie pleaded. 

"I can feel you, Annie," he replied, almost gone, as her hand guided him home.

He didn't need an invitation to cross her threshold anymore.

His rhythm was slow, almost too slow to bear.

"Can you feel me, love?"

Annie could only nod and meet him stroke by stroke.

"Open your eyes now. Look at me." 

Mitchell needed her to see into his eyes to plant an essential notion in her mind as he was running out of time to say it before he couldn't anymore. 

As Annie opened her eyes, he spoke, " _This_ is what's real Annie. Nothing else." 

Mitchell's pace picked up, making them both pant.

"Say it to me, Annie. Tell me that you can feel this is real."

There were no secrets left in between them. 

"It's real. _This_ is real," Annie said, wanting to please him and give him whatever he wanted from her.

There were no more words after that as language was destroyed, used up, there was only what their bodies could spell and the messages that Mitchell's fingers wrote just above where they were joined.

Only Mitchell's name remained in Annie's mind.

And with the taste of it on her lips, she fell down her bliss, with Mitchell following soon after. 

Annie felt she was made of the earth itself, rivers ran through her veins, and the creating wind was born among the curls on her head.

Mitchell took them both to the bed in a painfully sweet way. He was so careful, making sure to do everything in his power to let herself believe nothing would rip her away from his world. Still, the way his body clung to her, anchoring to the earth, made Annie wonder if he was just as fearful about someone taking her away.

Mitchell pulled the sheet over their bare bodies and under it, an idle hand traced circles on her thigh, making every ghostly cell of her body prickle. 

After a while, both turned to lie on their backs in silence. Annie was counting and memorizing the water stains on the ceiling to try to avoid thinking about what had just transpired when she felt him push himself slightly from the bed. He reached over her to grab something from the side table on her side.

"Hello there," he said, smiling cockily as his chest rubbed against hers and his mouth was just inches away from her lips.

"What are you doing?" Annie asked when she noticed him grabbing his lighter and pack of smokes. "You're not going to smoke now, are you?" she asked with a frown.

"I'm most certainly are," he replied, putting a cigarette on his lips and sitting up to lean against the headboard.

"You can't do that!" she yelled as she sat up, mimicking his pose.

"Why not? It's tradition! You know, after…," he couldn't quite finish the sentence and felt silly since he had never worried too much of his choice of words, but with Annie it was as if he was back at being a teenager, snickering at innuendos.

_'Christ,'_ he thought, _'I'm too bloody old to feel like this.'_

"It's disgusting and unhealthy… and… and... disrespectful," Annie stammered. 

There was something about them starting silly arguments about inane trivialities, perhaps subconsciously building a wall to separate them from what just happened between them.

"You and I are both dead, _my dear_. And I doubt it would make any difference." 

Annie stared him down as he attempted to light up, and without smiling, one of her eyebrows rose to dare him to continue.

Mitchell sighed and took the cigarette from his mouth in defeat. He was a 116-year-old mass murderer, and Annie still bested him just with a stare.

"Urgh! Okay. But there's something I need to warn you about," he said, getting closer and looking intently into her eyes.

"What is that?" she asked cautiously.

"I have an _oral fixation_ ," he said with a lopsided smile while he snaked his arm behind her back and pulled her to him.

"You'll have to give me something to distract my mouth with."

Instead of waiting for a reply, he captured her mouth with his. They kissed without hurry, giving each other time to bask in the sensation, without the rush and desperation of their previous experiences. When they pulled apart, he kept his forehead on hers. Even before the new nature of their relationship, the forehead thing had started being a staple of their interaction. Some sort of intangible connection seemed to develop and feed off the intense stares of those furtive moments.

When the kiss broke, Annie moved to try to find a comfortable position. When he had pulled her, she found herself cradled in between his legs and securely wrapped in his arms. Besides the comfort issues, she felt an unbearable electrical current flowing through her veins which fed off the intensity of his eyes on hers. She needed a respite from it, to break the power of his stare and hide her own eyes, afraid that he'd be able to read every secret thought. 

Mitchell smiled at her task of finding her place in his arms.

"Careful down there," he warned as her fumbling made the roundness of her bum brush against quite a sensitive spot of his. Annie froze in place, and he laughed that low throaty laugh of his. Mitchell then decided to help her by moving her like a doll until her back was flush against his chest. She relaxed and let her head fall against him over his arm, and he inhaled the smell of her hair in the crook of her neck.

After a few minutes, he rested his chin on her shoulder and finally spoke, "Are you going to tell me now what happened?" 

Gone was the former playfulness of his voice. Mitchell had succeeded luring her to a place of calm and safety amid his stubborn arms.

She sighed sorely.

"I told you."

"Tell me _properly_ now." 

Annie stayed silent for a few moments, but Mitchell gave her time, running the tip of his nose slowly against her shoulder.

"I was walking, and I saw an accident," she said after inhaling and swallowing, loud enough for him to hear. "A car crashed against a pole. I went there thinking that I thought I could help, but they had all died. Three… They were three… I thought I could help them pass on, but they held on to me and tried to get me through their doors. It was like Saul all over again… _But worse._ "

Sometimes she hated herself for feeling so helpless and always running to him for protection.

_Someone_ had forged that nasty idea of her weakness in her mind.

Mitchell could feel the anger rushing inside him, but remained silent, afraid she'd stop talking.

"They were taunting me. When they couldn't take me. I told them you and George could see me and they said you wouldn't anymore."

"That is a lie. You know that, right?" He interrupted; offended at the implication that one day he'd let her disappear.

"But it's not. It really isn't a lie, is it Mitchell?" she asked, turning so she could see him over her shoulder. "I came home and couldn't hold the doorknob, and then you just went past me. You couldn't hear me either."

"I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry," he begged for forgiveness, burying his face in her curls, making Annie feel guilty.

"It's not your fault."

Her words made him lift his head to look into her eyes again.

"I won't let them take you. And you'll never be invisible to me again," Mitchell vowed.

"You can't promise me that," she said, turning back on her side, pulling her legs up against her chest. Her actions making their connection break. 

His skin felt cold without hers.

"I can, and I will."

"Thank you," she replied, always polite as she conceded, letting her fear go to a deeper place.

"I don't want you to walk around at night on your own," he said after a few minutes, gently pulling her back against him.

"Mitchell," Annie protested at the thought but not the action.

"I'm serious. What would George and I have done without you? What if we never even have known what happened to you?" 

It was now his turn to show his helplessness.

"It's not safe for you to be out on your own. You're not going out," Mitchell said finally like he was casting a prophecy to stone. 

This was the way he dealt with his fears; the way he had been taught a man should, more than a century before.

"You're going to tell me what to do now?" She asked defiantly, and he laughed internally at their ever exchange of roles.

"You know what I mean," he said, trying to appease her.

"First of all," she started to explain half turning to look into his eyes, and making the sheet around her chest slid down slightly.

He immediately cut her off, "Yes, I know, I know. I am _not_ your father."

And looking down at bare breasts, he added, "And _thank God_ for that."

"Mitchell!" she yelped, looking away in embarrassment.

"You're blushing," he stated the obvious, and she could hear that annoying male smugness.

"I can't blush, I have no blood," she countered.

"No you don't, but I know _you_ , and I know what your eyes look like that when you're invisibly blushing."

"Okay fine, I'm blushing. Not all of us can be suave and worldly like you. Check on me in a hundred years when I'm your age. I'll be all cynical and cold and collected."

"No," he said, placing his hand on her cheek to stop her from looking away. "I want you to still blush when you're my age. And with a little bit of luck, I may still be around to make you blush then."

Her heart skipped, begging for a promise.

"Anyways, you know what I'm thinking just now?" he asked, not waiting for a reply. "Pity we don't show in a photograph, I could show George that you have no problem touching _poor leper old me_."

He was smiling smugly, and Annie couldn't stop a smile from blooming on her face as she swatted at him without conviction. 

After some silent moments, Annie spoke, "Should tell him about this?"

Annie's question made Mitchell feel something odd in his chest, a feeling he did not recognize.

"Well," he replied instead, distracting himself, "you told him you were never going to talk to him about your sex life and I believe you didn't want to hear him talking about his or mine…"

Neither he nor she completed the thought.

It was a minefield.

"Mitchell, can I ask you something?" She finally said, relaxing once more against him while his fingers wrote unintelligible words on her inner thigh.

"Anything."

"I need you to be honest. _Brutally_ honest, if necessary."

"Ask the question already, Annie." 

"Can you _really_ feel me? I mean, I know you can feel me, feel something, at least, but," Annie stammered, and after a deep breath she asked, "Do I feel real or am I really just an echo?"

Mitchell wondered if he would ever be able to erase that fear.

_All_ of her fears, really.

"Annie, look at me," he asked, and she complied. "I _really_ can feel _you_."

"I thought vampires were too vulnerable to the cold. That's why you wear your gloves all the time, right?" Annie said without waiting for his reply. "And I'm as cold as ice. You told me that time when we kissed by accident that I felt like someone who had just come in from outside. That's not normal, that's _not_ real."

He recognized the voice inside that was torturing her, not letting her believe it was possible.

"Annie, we're _light-years_ away from that kiss. Yes, at first it feels a little cold, but then it changes. Believe me," he said, and his eyebrows rose high, "you're anything but cold. We wouldn't have _this_ if you were."

_'This,'_ a new word for what they couldn't name.

"You believe me, right?"

Annie stared for a while, and without conscious thought, her hand came to his cheek, moving slowly against his stubble. Mitchell had to close his eyes at the contact, and, bringing his own hand to cover hers, he pulled her palm to his lips, pressing a kiss there.

"Yes," she finally replied.

Opening his eyes, he spoke, "Why don't I believe you? What's on your mind?"

"Someone told me I feel _squishy_."

"Who?" he asked, feeling his anger rise again, with that imperative need to find her tormentors.

"Tully," she replied, knowing the sole mention of his name would unleash his anger.

Mitchell's jaw locked, reawakening an old fury.

"Was it when he scared you?"

"Yes."

"You're real _to me_. Jesus Christ! You're beyond real. You're _perfect_."

He finally saw the flicker of hope in Annie's eyes, and he held her closer, trying to have her firmly rooted to the same ground as him. 

Praying internally that he'd be able to keep his promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once more, I didn't expect anyone to read this story, so thank you once more for reading and for taking the time to write down your comments.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> George learns about what happened to Annie, and he and Mitchell come up with a plan to make sure she is always safe. Annie is not pleased with the way both her boys plan to do so, though. Mitchell accompanies her while she walks the street of Bristol and they have a conversation about missed opportunities, but they are interrupted by someone from Mitchell's past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I go further into this story, it seems like my writing was a bit less atrocious, who knows... I'm trying to make it better, but despite that, I have found myself falling back in love with them and with this story. I hope you are enjoying it as well.

Mitchell's call had been cryptic, and George had not been able to shake the uneasiness it had brought to his chest all through his work shift. He had asked for more details, but Mitchell had only said, 'It's Annie.' Those words and the tone he used had been enough for George to know that something was terribly wrong. 

All day, he had kept looking at his watch, and the very moment his shift was over, he had rushed home, after cancelling plans with Nina, but despite how he had run to reach their door, he had dreaded whatever he was to find on the other side. 

George unlocked the door and entered cautiously, the eery silence doing nothing to lower his anxiety. It grew tenfold, knowing with such proximity to the full moon, his hearing was better than ever. 

All the lights were out except for a dim lamp in the living room. George approached it slowly and saw Mitchell sitting on the leather sofa with Annie's head on his lap. Once Mitchell caught sight of him, he gestured to remain silent. He bent down and kissed the dark curls softly and extricated himself, leaving a now apparently sleeping Annie on the couch.

Mitchell then signalled for George to follow him to the kitchen. Once there, and only when he was sure that Annie had not woken up, he spoke, "Hey mate. I imagine you have questions."

"That's an understatement," George replied, his eyebrows stretched as high as they went. "What happened?"

"Well, apparently, Annie witnessed a car crash and the ghosts of the people killed were too keen on getting her through one of their doors."

"Like Saul," George added, remembering that awful experience.

"Yes," Mitchell replied, and after taking a moment to exhale loudly, and rub at his chin, he continued, "Though, she was a lot more shaken from this. They got to her by saying that soon we wouldn't be able to see her."

"That's ridiculous," George dismissed the idea.

"Well," Mitchell said, looking at the floor, beating himself up for what had transpired.

"What do you mean?"

"She came home, and…" 

Mitchell's dead heart felt heavier than usual at the thought.

"And what?" George asked as anger started crawling under his skin. He felt where it was going, and he refused to accept the possibility.

"I didn't see her, George," Mitchell blurted out, and the pitiful look on his face told George enough about his regret. "I looked through her, and she couldn't speak, that's what she told me, afterwards." 

Mitchell ran a hand through his hair, feeling every bit as old as each one of the years he carried with him. 

"She came back to the house. You were gone, and I was getting ready... It was only momentarily…"

Mitchell's hands were moving about in the air, and he shook his head, leaning back against the sink, with his hands coming down in defeat.

"She was there, and I didn't see her, mate." 

Mitchell let his fist hit the countertop. 

"They really did a number on her, you have no idea the state she was in."

"God," was all George could muster.

"Thankfully she's calm now," Mitchell explained, with his head nodding towards the living room. I was amazed she let herself doze off."

"Is that the first time she sleeps?" George inquired, almost sure he already knew the answer.

"That I know of? Yes."

"Wow! What's that? Two years without even a wink? So much for sleeping when you're dead." The thought scared George.

"She was afraid of dreaming," Mitchell explained, but he left out precisely what nightmares he knew Annie feared. They both had decided to keep from George what awaited beyond the door. "She still is, but I think it was just too much. At least she seems calm and not as restless as before."

"What did you do to help her calm down?" 

Mitchell had not anticipated that question.

"Ah… Just talk to Annie, be with her, I guess," Mitchell answered while he busied himself picking up mugs and taking them to the sink. "Right now, she seems to really need having us around, talking her and holding her hand."

George nodded as Mitchell spoke.

"She needs contact, that's it. She's afraid that if we're not looking at her or touching her, she's going to disappear."

"Poor thing," George said as he looked in the direction of Annie.

"Though I have a theory."

"Which is?"

"She seems to be affected by how confident she feels. She's empowered, and she's solid, humans can even see her. She gets taunted, and she's invisible. Now, they seemed to have really affected her to the point of us not being able to see her. At least that's the only explanation I can think of for why I couldn't see her."

George took a couple of moments to digest the theory.

"So, what do you suggest? A self-esteem seminar for spirits?"

"Don't be daft," Mitchell said with a deep frown.

"Well, I really…"

"Mitchell?" Annie interrupted, coming through the beaded curtain into the kitchen with a full head of unruly curls.

"Annie," George said her name, walking to her with determination.

"George!" Annie yelled, jumping to his arms, and letting him hold her tight.

"Annie, I'm so sorry, sweetheart," he said, combing her hair with his fingers.

"Thank you, I feel better now."

"We're never leaving you, you hear me? We're not letting you go," George vowed with his face against her curls. 

Mitchell watched the two people he cared the most in the world, embracing and something that had been tight in his chest seemed to start loosening. 

"You told her that, right, Mitchell?" George asked, looking over Annie's head to his friend.

"He did, and I know," Annie said without letting go from George.

"So what do we do now?" George asked as Annie released him from the hug. The question was for everyone and nobody in particular.

"I don't know, nothing I guess," Annie sighed.

"Well, to start, we'll make sure that someone is always with you," Mitchell said, his tone more of an order more than a suggestion.

"I think I was just exaggerating. It wasn't that bad, really." 

It was Annie's personality, to try to make it better, to not give herself too much attention.

"Annie," Mitchell said, fully aware what she was doing. 

It was one of Annie's traits that could really upset him.

"Let's just drop it. Can I make you guys some tea?" she asked, deflecting and not really waiting for a response.

They both let it go and gave Annie the satisfaction of making things better through her tea.

"So George, I thought you were going to Nina's tonight," Annie said as she set the kettle on the stove.

"Well, I needed to make sure you were alright." 

"Oh, that's nonsense. You only got back together! It's important to keep intimacy in such a delicate state of a relationship."

"Why does that sound like something out of a girl's magazine?" George asked, surprised at Annie's sudden change of mood.

"Because she's been reading your _Cosmos_ ," Mitchell explained getting the milk out of the fridge.

"I don't buy _Cosmo_!"

"No, you don't. You have a subscription," Annie explained while getting the mugs from the cupboard.

"I have never bought a subscription for _Cosmo_ ," George said offended.

"No, you haven't. I did, with your credit card," Annie said with her usual mischievous smile.

"Annie!"

"I guess I should have let you know about that before," she replied with barely the hint of a grimace.

"You knew! Why didn't you tell me?" He yelled at Mitchell.

" _Cosmo_ magazine started arriving for Mr G. Sands. You're my mate, George. I love you, but I really didn't want to have that conversation with you. Anyway, who was I to question your reading preferences? I didn't know they were Annie's."

"You truthfully believed I'd buy it? Worse! That I'd be an avid reader?"

"You have been known to read _Martha's Stewart Living_ in the past, you know?" Annie said, giving a cup to smiling Mitchell.

"Glad to know I provide the comic relief in this house."

"No, George! I love you. I wouldn't give up on the afterlife for anyone but _you two_ ," she said hugging George and looking over to Mitchell who was leaning against the counter, and while he smiled, something in his chest still ached at knowing what Annie had given up.

Even more, when he thought about the price, the split decision to ignore her door would have.

"I love you too, Annie," George said, remembering how close they'd come again to losing her. He thought about how difficult it had been letting himself like her in the beginning. George smiled, remembering just how she had sneaked into his heart despite all his efforts.

"And we love you too, Mitchell. Even if you don't want a three-way hug," Annie added, not letting go of George.

Mitchell looked on with a pleased grin, must of all, glad to see Annie reassured and happy.

* * *

For several people, Mitchell's work was as low and disgusting as jobs could get. Day in and day out he'd clean vomit, urine and faeces from the floors. Many female nurses who found him attractive wondered how someone who looked like him would be alright performing such a terrible task. But they didn't know that Mitchell would much rather deal with bodily secretions than clean after the bad accident victims. Thankfully, he seldom had to clean at the Emergency Room, so it was just the rest of the less _'glamorous'_ secretions in his line of work.

Not that he really enjoyed it either, but it didn't bother him. 

Sometimes he even wondered if cleaning up the most basic products of humanity would count in his favour in the end. Doing his penance early, sort of speak. It was nothing compared to his evil deeds of the past, but he reckoned that it had to count towards something.

The key to his job was that it helped clear his mind. It could go utterly blank while he performed the menial, repetitive work. It brought much-needed relief to his ever-constant hunger.

But that night was not the case, though. He hadn't been able to get to that blessed blank zone for a few days. Mitchell suspected it was that he was still worried about Annie. 

The fear of losing her consumed him. 

That, and of course, _the other thing_. 

Mitchell was interrupted continuously by flashes: the colour of the skin on her hip, the sound of her ghostly sigh, the smell of her curls, the taste of her kisses, the feel of her all around him consuming it all.

He felt too old and too cursed to be so obsessed with those memories. He'd try to chase the lovely glimpses away, but like a pendulum of doom, his mind would swing back to the fear of doors swallowing her away when she was out of his sight.

Mitchell's immortality came with the ability to go working and running for days without exhaustion, but the thoughts that were haunting him made his muscles ache and the weight of over a century slow down his steps.

He stopped mopping for a moment and leaned back on the dirty powder blue wall of the ward he was cleaning. He needed to get home, make sure that Annie was all right and lie down in the couch and watch something inane on the telly until he was, once more, a numbed dead corpse.

And who knew, maybe Annie would spend the night in his room again. Mitchell shook his head at that thought, a. nd instead, he looked up to see that thankfully his shift was almost over. 

The way back to the pink house was no different to what his shift had been like, continually alternating between dangers hidden behind every corner, waiting patiently for Annie, and those forbidden thoughts about the two nights they had spent together. 

As Mitchell opened the door and got inside, he bumped right into the source of his uneasiness.

"Hey, were you going out?" he asked, with a hand on her waist.

"Ah… yup," Annie responded, over-enunciating the final 'p'.

"Is George coming?" Mitchell asked, looking behind Annie for their friend.

"Ah… No…" Annie stammered, over-extending the vowel and keeping her full lips pursed while she looked around.

"You were going to go out on your own?! Annie!" he yelled with his eyebrows knit together. 

"What? I'm 22… Actually, make that 25, and I don't need to ask you permission, or George's!"

"I'm not having this argument right now. Where is George?" Mitchell asked, walking to the living room and then the kitchen, looking for George and followed by a very disgruntled ghost.

"He left you alone?!" He asked, his voice going up a couple of octaves.

"No! He didn't leave me alone, and for your information, _Mitchell_ , I do not need a babysitter." 

Annie was sulking by then, and her arms were crossed tightly over her chest. The look on her face almost made Mitchell laugh. Her lips were so full that they were almost always in a pout, but when she really felt wronged, her pursed lips almost made her look like a little girl throwing a tantrum.

"We've been through this," Mitchell said, with his hands up, trying to appease her.

"I know!" Annie yelled in response, with her arms in the air. "I know I was terrified, but I'm _fine_ now. No pushy ghosts, no doors, no voices in the telly nor in any other appliances."

"Annie!"

"It's just..." she had to exhale loudly before she could continue, "I get stir crazy here. I've been here forever, and there's nothing new on the telly, and I've read every single book and magazine we own. I'm not kidding. I mean _everything_ , including anything _someone_ might have wedged between the mattress and the box-spring."

"Fine! Where is George then?"

"He's in his bedroom… with Nina."

"Ah, great, so he while he's having a _shagfest_ you go out on your own. That's just perfect," he said sarcastically, letting his arms fall down loudly over his jeans.

"Oh, leave them be. They're young and in love and that's what you're supposed to do when you're young, and in love, you stay in bed as much as you can."

After she finished saying that they both remained silent, looking at each other but unsure of how to follow that statement.

"Okay then," he said, finally conceding.

"Okay, what?"

"Let's go."

"Where?" Annie asked, confused.

"What do you mean where? Out! That's what you wanted, isn't it?"

"Yes," she replied coldly.

"Why don't you look happy? Jesus woman! I'm so damn old, and I still cannot get women right," Mitchell said, rubbing his palms on his eyes.

He then lowered his hands, and turning towards her, he asked, "Or is it that you don't want to go out with me?"

"No, it's not that," she replied, shaking her head, but then she grimaced and added, "Well, maybe it is."

"Oh, Annie, you're going to be the death of me. Like, _death for good_ ," He said, half-laughing.

Annie shrugged before adding, "I just like thinking." 

"I'll tell you what. I promise not to talk. If it makes a difference, I can even walk a few steps behind you."

"Like what? A bodyguard? That's just ridiculous. You can walk with me."

"That settles it then. Go on. Ladies first," he said, opening the door and standing on the side to let her go by.

"Are you sure? You look tired."

"Don't really need the sleep, do I?"

* * *

After a good silent hour of roaming through deserted streets, Annie finally spoke, "Oh, this is ridiculous!"

"Wandering the streets at night in the cold when we could be at home watching something on the telly? Yes, it is," Mitchell added, trying to annoy her.

"No! That's not what I meant. I mean just walking and not talking."

"I thought that was what you wanted," Mitchell explained, with his eyebrow rising high on his forehead. "You said you wanted to think."

"Well, I wanted to get out, I was feeling cooped up. Watching telly is boring."

"It's not when you have been out all day at work, and may I remind you that I spend my day moping piss and shit?" he added, budging her with his shoulder.

"It is when you're me, and I can't go to work, and I just stay home cleaning the place and picking up after _you_."

"What? Don't tell me you will start telling me, ' _You never take me anywhere,'_ when did we turn into an old boring married couple?"

"You never buy me flowers anymore," she offered instead. 

"You spend all my money," he countered, looking ahead, but Annie could see the corner of his mouth curling a bit.

"You're losing your hair," she added, barely keeping it straight.

"You only care about the kids."

"You snore."

"You stopped shaving your legs."

Annie had to stop, and she doubled over in laughter.

Mitchell stopped next to her, smiling widely. 

"Wow," Annie said after composing herself, and linking her arm with Mitchell's, "that doesn't sound good, does it? Why are we always envying humans?" 

"Because it's as lovely as it is awful," he replied, looking towards her, and then he looked down before he added, "And because we cannot have it."

Annie's smile disappeared all at once, and it made Mitchell sigh with sorrow.

"Yes, that's the thing."

They walked together longer, arm in arm. Mitchell would steal glances towards her from time to time, wondering what was going through her head.

"That's all I ever wanted, you know?" She said, a long while after, just like that, as if their conversation hadn't stopped. "Nothing more. Like that Gwen Stefani song _'A simple kind of life'_? I should have known it was too much to ask. A house, a husband, the kids and the dog. All I wanted was an ordinary life. But it wasn't meant to be for me."

Whatever half-life he had was deserved, he thought, but it both angered and saddened him that she had been robbed of so much.

"No, you couldn't have had an ordinary life," Mitchell said, stopping them both and placing himself in front of Annie, close enough for her to have to look him in the eye, and he was able to see the question in hers.

"Because a life _with you_ could never be _ordinary_."

She couldn't stop a tear starting to form in her eye, which Mitchell noticed and rubbed it away with his thumb. Mitchell's fingers slid until they cradled the nape of her neck. He looked at her mouth and then at her eyes as if asking permission and Annie moved the little space there was left in between them.

The kiss was slow and cautious, a kiss to forget a life not lived.

They didn't get to find out what it would lead to, because a voice pierced the night's silence.

* * *

"Mitchell, Mitchell, Mitchell… Are you going to fuck her or feed on her?"

Mitchell turned around to see two vampires: he recognized the man from decades ago, wiry with longish greasy hair falling over his face. The woman he didn't know, some pixie-looking thing with bubble-gum pink hair.

"Arthur? What do you want?"

"She looks tender and naive. Is he messing with your heart as well as with your panties, love?" The vampire said to Annie, ignoring Mitchell's question. 

Annie stood there, holding on to Mitchell's jacket as he tried to shield her, noticing that his eyes had turned completely black.

"You don't talk to her. Leave before I have to make you. You don't want to look bad in front of your friend here," Mitchell warned his old acquaintance.

"Sorry to ruin your little con game. You always liked playing with _your food_ , didn't you?" The vampire said, ignoring his threat.

"I thought you said he was on the wagon," the woman that had been quiet until then said, looking at Annie with interest.

"Someone told me the mighty John Mitchell was abstaining and I thought that was the most ludicrous lie I had heard in fifty years. And then I come here, and look what I find out," Arthur continued to taunt, as he paced around.

"What are you doing in Bristol? I thought you were banished."

"Well, he's dead, isn't he? See, we got wind of it all the way to London and now every fang Herrick scared off is back. It seems Bristol here is the new wild wild west. A town without law is a town with… _opportunities_."

"She's lovely, isn't she? All those bouncy curls!" The female vampire was now coming closer to Annie, extending her hand trying to touch her hair, over Mitchell's shoulder.

"You do not look at her!" Mitchell yelled, baring his teeth.

"Oh, _Johnny boy_ , Herrick's golden child. You were never really good at sharing, were you?" He sneered.

"She's… different," the female vampire exclaimed, noticing something.

"How… _exotic_! A ghost!" Arthur finally said, a broad smile breaking on his face once he realized what Annie was.

"Is this another one of your pets, Mitchell? I heard you got yourself a _golden retriever._ "

"You stay the hell away of me and what's mine," Mitchell said menacingly.

"Oh, I get it! You're into animals now, you got yourself a dog, and now you have a nice little canary. How is it biting her? I heard you were going vegan, but this is just ridiculous. After having her you, you must still be left feeling hungry. A bit like after eating Chinese food."

"Get away from here," Mitchell barked.

"Herrick is dead Mitchell. And you are probably weakened without proper nourishment. No offence sweetheart," Arthur said, looking at Annie who frowned disgusted at the newcomer. "And it's two of us here. Holly here, is quite feisty, you know? I fancy coming back to Bristol to take down Herrick's beloved child, who also happens to be the owner of the mutt who killed him. Imagine the street cred it would give me!"

Arthur launched himself at Mitchell. He had been expecting him, and he held him by the neck to stop him, but he had to let go of Annie to do so. As he did, he kept an eye on the other vampire who was sauntering towards her.

Annie had been silent all through Arthur's and his companion's taunts. It worried Mitchell, as he always hated showing his friends that this side of him. He feared them seeing him for what he really was, a monster. 

Arthur took advantage of the distraction and hit him, releasing himself from his hold, Mitchell had to focus on him, but it meant turning his back to Annie.

"Annie, go!" he yelled.

The female vampire charged towards Annie. She was seething with the awful things the vampire had implied and didn't have time to think. Annie just looked at the woman and let her anger take her. A rubbish container came flying to the woman and knocked her out, and at the same time, Mitchell overpowered Arthur, beating him to the ground.

"Get the fuck out of this town, Arthur, and take your trash with you," Mitchell said icily.

"Don't get too smug, Mitchell. You know it's just a matter of time before someone else tries to take over Herrick's operation by mounting a nice wolf head on their mantle."

Annie gasped.

"That someone would have to take me out first," Mitchell said, feeling a murderous anger pump through his veins.

"Exactly," the fallen vampire said with an evil grin.

Mitchell took Annie's hand, and he walked away, feeling almost incapable of taming the demon in his blood. The threats had awakened him; it was the blind fury that had fueled the legend of John Mitchell, the vampire who had killed countless humans and vampires alike.

* * *

Only when they had gotten right outside of their house, Mitchell let his eyes go back to normal. He turned around and addressed Annie for the first time since the encounter.

"Are you all right?" 

"I am," Annie answered almost too quietly.

"That was my fault," Mitchell apologized.

"Were they telling the truth? Is someone going to come for George and you?" Annie asked, the dread palpable in her tone.

Mitchell placed his hands on either side of her face, and he leaned in to speak, "I won't let them, Annie. You know I won't. You don't have to worry, most vampires wouldn't dare to mess with me."

"You mean with _'what is yours'_?" She asked, raising one eyebrow.

Mitchell let his hands fall to his sides, and he looked down, shaking his head.

"That's what I need them to think," he explained, daring to look her in the eye in the end.

"We're your property? Your pets, then?" Annie asked, afraid of this other side of the person she thought she knew best.

"No! You know I don't think like that," he explained, and one of his hands dared hold on to the grey sleeve of her cardigan, "but I rather they do. Vampires are not good at sharing. We can be vicious when we feel wronged."

Annie brushed the curls out of his face, and she noticed the fear in his eyes, not for other vampires, but for the thoughts in her mind, the very ones he could not reach.

"I believe you," she said, reassuring him at last, and she let herself come closer to him, resting her head on his chest, and letting him embrace her.

"We just can't catch a break, do we?" She added.

Mitchell took a moment to hold her tighter, and he kissed her forehead.

"I'll make sure we do, darling. Let's go inside."

As they made their way inside, Mitchell sincerely hoped he'd be able to keep his word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for taking the time to read and I'm always happy to interact if you leave a comment.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> George and Nina hear about Mitchell and Annie's encounter with some vampires. Annie reacts to the boys trying to keep her out of harm's way, and Nina gives them a piece of her mind on the topic. Mitchell vows to keep them all safe, though his way of protecting them is not particularly one his flatmates approve.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Life got complicated, but I'm still working on this fixing this fic.

They had barely made it inside the house when George was already coming down the stairs in his robe. 

"Oh my god! Where were you? I was worried sick!"

"Were you really, George?" Mitchell replied, suddenly exasperated. "I came home, and Annie was already going out. You didn't even notice us leaving, but I guess you were having too much of a good time with Nina."

"Ahem..." Nina cleared her throat as she was coming down the stairs, fully clothed as opposed to her boyfriend.

Nina had never been a fan of Mitchell, and he was confident his comment was bound to lose him even more points with George's girlfriend. George didn't take offence on the statement, and if he did, he was clearly too hung up on Mitchell's recrimination.

"I'm sorry, I thought we were supposed to be in the house, not that we had to have her in a 24-hour watch!"

"I'm here, you know? You don't have to refer to me as  _ 'her'  _ when I am present. I am a ghost, but I do not appreciate being ignored!" Annie yelled, getting her friends' attention.

"Well,  _ that _ was serious!" Mitchell justified himself.

"And everything was fine!" Annie reminded him, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Everything? Really? You call that  _ fine _ ?" 

"Stop right there, Mitchell.  _ 'That'  _ was about you, not about me," Annie added, poking his chest with her finger. "No ghosts, no doors. That was just your garden variety vampire problem." 

" _ That _ ?  _ Vampires _ ? Can we drop the comedy act for a minute and tell George, your housemate, what the hell happened?"

" _ Sweetie _ , please do not refer to yourself in the third person. It's not attractive," Nina asked.

"Nina!" he replied, looking offended in the direction of his girlfriend before turning back to his friends.

"What is Annie talking about Mitchell?" he asked, placing his hand on Mitchell's shoulder.

"I would have preferred to keep this from George, Annie," Mitchell said, turning his face slightly and opening his eyes wider signalling something to Annie.

"Keep  _ what _ for me?" George asked, pulling at Mitchell's shoulder, forcing him to turn his way.

"Oh, you can't be serious," said Annie. "This directly affects him. It affects us all. It even affects Nina."

"Mitchell?" George pressed.

"Alright…We ran into a vampire I knew from some decades ago. Herrick banished him because he was a loose cannon, that's all in a nutshell." 

Mitchell's voice attempted to lessen the importance of what had just taken place.

"Oh, that is nice to know. If Herrick, of all people, banished him for being a  _ 'loose cannon' _ " George spoke fast, gesturing the quotation marks with his fingers. "I can't imagine what it means in normal people terms. Did he have some sort of problem with you?"

"Ah, yes… no… not much more than with anyone else under Herrick," Mitchell replied with a shrug.

"Tell him, Mitchell," Annie added and Mitchell stared at her visibly displeased.

"He heard about Herrick, and he came back. I guess everyone else Herrick crossed also figured out that Bristol isn't under any sort of administration.  _ Vampire administration _ , that is. Power is up for grabs."

"And what would anyone have to do to take said power?" George asked, needing to hear out loud what he was already guessing.

"George…" Mitchell looked down.

"Mitchell, I think I can take it."

"Well, in vampire terms, it would mean to defeat whoever else is a contender… And…"

"And?" Nina prodded now.

"...And take out whoever killed the last one in charge."

It was all out in the open now.

"So… They're coming for me," George said, the words coming out of his mouth with the weight of shackles.

"It doesn't have to be that way!" Mitchell replied, desperation clear in his voice. "You are not a vampire, and you're not asking for Herrick's territory." 

"But it would make a nice demonstration. Wouldn't it?" George was smiling that sad grin he had every time he remembered his curse. His hands were on his head, and Nina hugged him burying her head in his chest.

"I guess it would."

"Oh, George." Nina sighed.

"I won't let them," Mitchell said with determination.

"Could we not have five minutes of happiness around here? So just this month we've had retaliating ghosts and now vampires," George added.

"Just to make sure. There is not a werewolf mafia going to come and knock on the door, right?" Nina asked.

"We can only hope," Annie replied.

"What happened with the vampire?" George asked, turning back.

" _ Vampires _ ," Annie added nonchalantly.

"I beg your pardon?" George inquired.

"It was two of them." 

"Two? Mitchell?"

"I only knew Arthur. The other one, the girl, she must be young. She came with him." His friend explained.

"And what happened?" Nina asked, still close to George.

"I took care of Arthur."

"Is he…?"

"No. I only threatened him. He won't be coming after you, or Nina, or Annie." Mitchell reassured his friends.

"You mean he won't be coming after your property," Annie added, remembering her prior dislike of Mitchell's choice of words.

"Yes, Annie, he won't be coming after  _ my property, _ " Mitchell said exasperated. "I'm sorry it offended you, but those are terms vampires can understand. It doesn't make quite the same impression to ask _ 'Oh, by the way, would you terribly mind not killing my BFFs?' _ " His voice was now higher, and he was throwing his arms in the air.

"Oh, you…  _ stupid vampire. _ " 

It was all that Annie could say. Meanwhile, she pursed her lips and decided to get her point across silently.

A vase burst, making everyone else wince but Annie, who stood there, with her arms crossed on her chest.

"Jesus Christ!" Mitchell yelled ducking to avoid the shards.

"Annie! And then you wonder why we can't have nice things around here. You have to learn to control yourself," George admonished her.

"Oh, do not get me started  _ wolf boy _ . That wasn't me losing control. I fully intended for that to happen. Notice it was the one closest to Mitchell," she said, lifting her hand in his direction.

"That reminds me. What was that back there?" Mitchell added, picking up ceramic shards from his hair.

"What do you mean?" George inquired with his interest piqued.

"Annie took out Arthur's friend with a rubbish bin," Mitchell explained.

"Annie?"

"Oh, that trashy girl came charging at me, and I was already mad. That friend of yours had quite the potty mouth. I may be a lady, but I'm no pushover," Annie explained.

"So, Mitchell. What do you suggest we can do?" Nina asked.

"We're not going to do anything, Nina," George said.

"Well, of course, we have to do something! They want to get you," Nina disagreed.

"I'm going to take care of it. Nina, I promise you George will be safe," Mitchell promised.

Annie lifted one eyebrow and asked, "And how do you plan to do that?" 

"I need to go to the undertakers," he replied, avoiding his friends' gaze and anticipating already their dislike of the idea.

"Oh, hell no," Annie screamed.

George scratched the back of his head as his lips pursed, and then he asked, "Do you think that is a good idea, mate?"

_ 'Not at all,'  _ he wanted to reply, but instead, he said, "It's the only way."

"Going directly into the lions' den? Excuse me, but that is mental," Annie countered.

"There is much more at stake right now. You three are my priority, but without Herrick, there are many more liabilities. Without any structure, humans are at greater risk."

"Well, I don't think you should be going there. And I'm putting my foot down," Annie said, crossing her arms once more.

"Unfortunately, love, it's not your decision to make," Mitchell said, looking directly into her eyes.

"Oh, do not  _ 'love' _ me, John Mitchell. I do not appreciate your condescending tone. And just like that? You will not consider our opinion?"

"Do you agree with her?" Mitchell asked George.

"I rather you didn't go, yes."

"Well, I'm old enough to make my own decisions," Mitchell replied, avoiding their stares.

"And I'm not?" Annie asked baffled.

"What do you mean?"

"So before it was,  _ who let Annie out of her castle tower? Don't you know she's 12 and useless? _ "

"You're overdramatizing," Mitchell said, shaking his head. "This is not a prison, and I'm not your jail keeper."

"But I do get told what I can and cannot do, isn't that right?"

"Annie… We didn't mean that. It was for your own good," George said, trying to appease her.

"And I appreciated you being with me while I was scared, but I'm not anymore, and you still tell me what to do."

"You were going out on your own when not long ago you were attacked and almost dragged through a door," George added. "You have to understand, Annie. It's not that we doubt you, it's just that we worry that something bad can happen to you."

"You two are infuriating!" She yelled, and a mug exploded, as she popped out.

"Really mature," George said calmly.

"I can still hear you! And yes, I meant for that as well," Annie yelled from upstairs.

Nina slapped George on the head.

"Nina!" George wailed with his voice an octave higher.

"And that goes for you too Mitchell." 

"Really, Nina, this is none of your business. You don't understand what's going on here."

"Oh, I understand fully well what you're doing to that girl. I have two eyes, you know?"

"What do you mean?" Mitchell asked.

"You both treat her like she's some kind of bizarre Burtonesque undead Snow White! And don't give me that look. She's in the kitchen early in the morning, making you breakfast before you two go to work while she tidies the house. I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't see you off at the door with a kiss on the forehead and your lunch in a paper bag. What do you think she does all day? That she sings and the birds and squirrels help her wash your pants? And what do you do in return? You leave her warning her:  _ 'Don't open the door to strangers, dear, unless it is a creepy old lady giving away dodgy apples!' _ and then what? You march down your merry way."

"We do not do that… much," George said.

"It is time you both realize that she's not your daughter, she's not your mother, she's not your little sister, and she's  _ definitely _ not your wife."

It was not lost on Mitchell that the last admonition was said in his direction.

"Anyway, I should get going now," Nina sighed at the end of her rant.

"Nina, I rather you stayed here. With everything Mitchell said… I don't want anything happening to you… That is if you agree of course," George added fearfully.

"I'm not in the mood to fight with you, George. I'll stay just because it's quite late and I'm knackered."

The three of them went up the stairs to the bedrooms, and as Mitchell walked past Annie's room, he hesitated while reaching for the knob.

"Give her time, Mitchell," George advised.

Mitchell's hand stayed where it was, just hovering over the knob, and after tightening his fist as much as he could until it hurt, he brought his arm down and continued on to his own room. 

* * *

Annie heard them going to bed. 

She could hear Nina and George's muffled voices, and while she couldn't make out their words, the tone alone let her know that those were the words of a couple in love, worried about their future and comforting each other with kisses and caresses.

It was not possible to feel anything but lonely and dead.

She had also sensed Mitchell's hand on the doorknob before George told him to give her time, and it had been both relieving and disappointing.

Annie could no longer fool herself into thinking she and Mitchell were just friends. She thought of his taste, his voice when it got low, the texture of his stubble against her sensitive skin, his presence inside her.

And then, there were the other daydreams, the what if's, with their promise of a non-existent future.

But she had no future, and neither did he.

The future had been the place where she lived during most of the conscious hours of her very short life. The future had been the refuge while her reality with Owen didn't match the script in her mind. The future was outside, bright and warm with the rays of the sun, not the damp and dark cold of her pink house. 

Living in the future meant that she didn't have time to live in the harsh present of Owen's true self. And now, she couldn't afford to live in the future because it didn't exist anymore. Sure, it looked like she was going to be around for a while.

A  _ very _ long while probably. 

But eternity had that nagging habit of forcing you to live one day at a time.

Mitchell didn't think of the future, she was sure of it. He didn't live on his past either.

She realized that her obsession with the future in her mind, of how things ought to be was one of her worse traits.

Annie knew that she had a nagging habit of creating prisons in her mind where she caged those she loved.

The thought caught in her throat as Owen's voice hissed in her ear.

She was poison.

She made people do horrible things. And it was because in her mind she had to put together a reality so perfect, so unreal, that life, real life, had to become hell. Oh, she had started falling back into her old habits. Looking at Mitchell and grinning, needing his touch all the time. Pretending that her opinion would be law to him.

It didn't even matter.

She couldn't do that, not anymore.

Mitchell cared for her. Loved her even, in his own way, she was sure.

But she was a burden, a responsibility.

_ A nice pet. _

Someone to look after, to save, to earn redemption.

They had such a great friendship, and she had tarnished it.

They had too much at stake right then, and she couldn't let that get in the way.

_ 'That'  _ being her non-beating heart.

"Morning," Annie said to George as she walked into the kitchen and he was already having his breakfast while reading the paper.

"Morning, Annie. Are you feeling okay? You are normally up and about a lot earlier than anybody else."

"I'm only up and about early because I don't go to sleep, George." 

She had meant to be rude, to let her words come out as a slap, but instead, they sounded sad in her head, and the way George stared at her told her that they did for him as well.

"You know what I mean, Annie," George sighed. "Were you in your room?"

"Yes, I'm sorry," she said apologetically, unable to keep the meanness inside of her. "I just didn't feel my normal sunny self."

"Listen, I'm sorry. Nina was kind enough to open our eyes last night. We get so out of line when it comes to you. You are a wonderful, strong, independent woman who is more than capable of taking care of herself. That being said, we love you to pieces. 

George let the paper fall on the table, and he held on to Annie's hand.

" _ I _ love you to pieces," he reiterated, with his eyes opening wide, "and we are petrified that you leave us, or worse, that someone may take you away. We'd be going mental without you."

"Because you wouldn't know where the ironing board is? You should really consider it, George. You'd never run out of tea nor have to wash so many mugs," Annie added, trying to joke and getting up and letting George's hand fall on the table. She busied herself, pouring hot water from the kettle into a mug but forgoing the tea sachet. Annie didn't even feel like going through that pantomime. She just wanted the warm on her hands that morning.

"I'm not joking," George said, standing up and placing his hand on her arm reassuringly.

"I know," She said quietly after a while.

She pretended to look out of the window, but George was able to see that a tear escaped her eye.

"Where is everybody else? Are they gone?" She asked after wiping the tear away surreptitiously. "I didn't hear anyone mocking our corniness."

"Nina left early, with tonight and everything, she needed to check on her place before work."

"Time of the month?" Annie asked.

"Yes, tonight. We get to deal with our own supernatural burden. Mitchell left as well. I guess you know where to. Listen, Annie, I have work today, and then tonight I'll be... indisposed… But I can make sure I come by before, to check on you… Only if you want to, of course."

"I'm fine, George. I really appreciate it, but you don't have to, you already have too much on your plate as it is." 

Annie left her mug on the counter and placed the other hand on top of George's.

"Mitchell should be back before it gets dark," He added.

"I can take care of myself. Like you said, I'm a big girl, after all. And just to be safe, I won't go out. And anyway, I'm getting the hang on the whole poltergeist thingy. I think I'll practice more since it looks like we'll have more vampire confrontations in our future."

"Along with another trip to Ikea to buy more mugs and vases?" George asked, nudging her to make her smile.

"It comes with the territory, doesn't it? Better to have enough cheap backup china. And besides, we make such a kicking ass fighting team." 

The way her lips were curling wide made George feel warm inside. 

"The world gayest ninjas strike back?" He said, mimicking her grin.

"Oh, lord!"

Both of them were soon in stitches remembering.

"Thank god for Mitchell, then," George added, making the hollow in her chest return.

"I guess…" She said, looking out the window.

For having spent close to two years of her non-life devoid of most human physical feelings, it seemed to Annie that lately, her mind had been quite busy filling in the gaps of stimuli and giving her ghost sensations. She wondered if it was like what they say about amputees feeling pain from their missing limbs. There were many feelings and symptoms of humanity she had been experiencing quite a lot recently: stomach butterflies, blinding headaches from worrying too much, that horrible feeling you get when air gets sucked out of your lungs, the dizziness you experience when you come to a terrible realization, the sleeplessness of unrequited love… Or maybe that last one wasn't necessarily something new. 

_ 'How can any ghost figure out if they're losing sleep because they spend their time figuring out what are all those conflicting emotions they have for a certain someone when you don't really need to sleep?' _ she wondered.

That's what she had done to make time pass: an inventory of all the new things she had started doing since her death, and of all the new feelings and experiences.

She decided that while death was clinical with the rigidity of all the things she couldn't do, humanity was complicated enough as well.

After George left, she spent her day thinking, and by the time she looked at her wristwatch, and then when she peeked out of the window, it was already night time, and the full moon was hanging proudly in the sky. She said a silent prayer for George and Nina, who at the very same time were going through their horrible monthly death. The other side of her heart, meanwhile, had been worried sick about Mitchell who hadn't come nor called.

The door finally slammed shut downstairs around midnight. Annie chose to walk instead of using her powers because of her fear of the state he would be in. By the time she came out of her room, he was at the top of the stairs.

His eyes were still black, and he had a smudge of dried up blood on his jaw.

Mitchell looked at her and extended his hand, and despite the darkness of his eyes, Annie sensed his desperation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all who are reading, subscribing and leaving comments. I really did not expect anyone to read it. I appreciate your engagement and I am thrilled that there are still others who daydream about Mitchell and Annie.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mitchell recounts what happened at the undertakers and he and Annie have a heart-to-heart about their past humanity as George is out during a full moon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so terribly sorry, life got very complicated. 
> 
> I can promise that I will try to avoid it happening again, but these times are weird. What I can promise, though, is that this fic will not be abandoned. 
> 
> Thank you all for reading and for your nice comments.

Despite Mitchell's resolve to go to the undertakers and settle things once and for all, when he left the pink house, he found himself procrastinating for the most part of the day. He walked and smoked, knowing that sooner rather than later, he'd have to enter the vipers' nest. He had been so adamant, rude even, to the ones he loved about getting back into his past. It was for them, after all. But it didn't mean he was happy to do so.

It was already dusk when he finally got through the hated threshold.

The scene was decadent, and the theme seemed to be desecration and anarchy. The sight bothered Mitchell beyond his new life's morality: the carelessness and repudiation of any sort of order over chaos.

"Jesus Christ, people! We have over millennia of combined ages, and you act like you are bloody teenagers at a punk rock self-destructive spree!" he yelled.

Some heads turned towards him, and he could hear the whispers.

The undertakers old building, which generally would be stark and empty, was now full to the brim with vampires, must faces new to him, along with some of the low-lives that Herrick had banished. Some were fighting, slamming one another against walls and smashing furniture; others, covered in blood, were in the midst of sex with multiple partners; and though hidden by the many people in the rooms, he could hear and smell the victims being drained. Their pulses were so loud that he could feel his head being crushed by their heartbeats and the smell in his nostrils was so intoxicating his walk faltered.

The acrid smell of blood blurred the logical part of him while something more primal was being unlocked. The thumping of veins and arteries, not only within the premises but also all through the city, reverberated like ritualistic drums announcing a bad omen. He would close his monster eyes to try to calm himself, but the blood kept hissing its spelling charm into his ear.

He opened his eyes, and in the periphery, he noticed the hint of dark curls among the crowd of predators and prey, sparking lust and dread within him. He was walking now among the bodies, shoving and elbowing away, catching just glimpses of coffee and caramel, until finally she turned her head, and it wasn't the one for which he feared the most.

His imagination exploded nevertheless.

He was no longer in the damp and dingy building, littered by the undead and the nearly dead, but in a jungle near the sea. He could feel the sort of warmth he hadn't felt since his human days. Suddenly, he was another kind of predator, though his prey seemed more than happy to be stalked.

She looked like she had never looked before; her curls were looser than usual, and her hair longer and lighter by the love of the sun. Whenever she'd turn, her full smile would greet him, mischievous, playing hard to get, her cheeks flushed, her blood singing a siren's song for him and only him.

She was wearing her white camisole and nothing more, and all her skin was covered in a sheen coat of sweat. Mitchell liked the roundness of her hips, her shapely calves, her high cheekbones. Her entire body yelled how alive it was, and she seemed to laugh, to giggle, and to beg to be caught.

The dream changed abruptly, and then she was lying at the bottom of the stairs: her skin no longer the colour of milky coffee but grey, her afterlife grey. She didn't have the bloody halo around her curls, though. No, she was dry, her cheeks sunken, black pools under her eyes, her once beautiful, and oh so kissable, full lips languid and apart.

And he could taste her, in the back of his throat and dripping from his chin.

He felt the pain and the horror in his chest. He opened the eyes he didn't know were closed and it was the same debauchery at the undertakers, the same supple bodies undulating against him, inviting, the potent smell of blood, of life and death.

He felt disgusted.

He heard his own growl and the thud of the vampire he had just slammed face-first into the nearest wall.

The crowd now had his full attention, admonished by the force of his alpha status.

"Now, that is a Mitchell I can recognize. I really couldn't believe all the nonsense people have been saying about you," a deep voice uttered, almost mocking him.

"Ivan?" Mitchell asked, turning to meet his old friend.

"The one and only. Why don't we go somewhere quieter where grown-ups can talk?" Ivan asked, holding a tumbler of scotch.

"Herrick would be quite disappointed to know his pride and joy was being used as a frat house, you know?" Ivan asked as he closed the door behind them.

"What are you doing here, Ivan?" Mitchell asked, ignoring the previous comment.

"Just some sightseeing, not really interested in taking old William's territory if that is what you are wondering. You know I'm a family man. You must remember my Daisy. She is all spunk that one. Lovely feisty little thing, sharp as a whip. Everybody deserves a Daisy, really…"

"Yeah, she's lovely," Mitchell commented dismissively.

"We must all get together. Daisy was very excited to come to Bristol, and I couldn't say no. Historical times for our kind, really. And she's quite keen on meeting your werewolf," Ivan remarked, lifting his eyebrows.

"That is out of the question, and he's not _my_ werewolf, he's my _friend_ ," Mitchell made clear.

"You know this is all a big mistake, Ivan. If this keeps on, it'll be the end of our kind, not only here. You know this, don't you?"

"Well, for what I've heard you haven't been too preoccupied for maintaining our ways," Ivan replied before sipping his drink.

"But I have never put our existence in jeopardy."

"One can argue it, taking into account what your _friend_ did."

"We had no choice! George had no choice! Herrick was out of control," Mitchell explained.

Ivan looked at him, and he smiled sideways.

"What is it that they say? About the evil you know…"

"You have to help me get things back in control," Mitchell pleaded.

"You know how much I hate politics," Ivan replied with a grimace. "It seems like you have your hands full. It's a matter of time before someone comes for the _were_ — _George_. Sorry, I've heard you're quite attached."

Mitchell rubbed his hand over his forehead and back into his hair for a moment and then, he placed both hands on his hips as he paced around.

"I won't let them hurt George! Or Annie!"

"Oh yes! There's quite the talk about the ghost. Quite _exceptional_."

Mitchell's nostril's flared, and he could feel the black starting to seep back into his eyes at the mention of Annie, but he managed to control it.

"They will be coming after you as well," Ivan continued, disregarding Mitchell's apparent rage at the mention of the ghost girl, "you are the _'heir apparent'_ after all."

"How can _I_ be? I turned my back to all of this," Mitchell said in disbelief. "I went on the wagon."

"And _still_ you are the _legendary_ John Mitchell, a threat to Herrick and the owner of the mutt who took him out. The way I see it, the only way Bristol can get back in control is to have you lead them," Ivan said, tilting his glass to him.

"That is mental! You know it, Ivan. Don't tell me it makes sense to you. I don't want to come back, I won't be able to refrain if I do."

Mitchell was clutching tight at the back of the chair.

"Then maybe there is your answer," his friend said with a Cheshire cat smile.

"I need to go, this is not helping," Mitchell said exasperated as he ran his hand through his hair one more time.

"Take my advice," Ivan called as Mitchell walked away, "and let _everybody_ know you are the law around here, or those you have found so good to live with will be the ones to pay." 

There was no mirth left in his words.

"Everyone should know by now I'm not someone to mess with," Mitchell said, turning back with his hand on the door handle.

Ivan grinned and stared at his drink for a moment, and then said, "Unfortunately, there are a lot of young ones around, hungry for the chance to stick it to the man, and my friend, _you are the man now_."

Mitchell's eyebrows knitted, and he considered Ivan's words for a moment.

After a moment, he said, as he opened the door to the main room, "Then I guess I need to make a statement."

"Listen up, people!" he yelled to the people outside. "For those of you who are not familiar with me, I am John Mitchell, _the_ John Mitchell."

"I've heard about you," a blond vampire barely clothed said as she snaked her arms around Mitchell's neck and rubbed her body against him. Her mouth was bloody, and she kissed his jaw, licking her way to his lips.

"I've heard you haven't had a drink in a while. Let me get you a warm one, and you can lick it off my body afterwards," she offered.

"Sorry _sweetheart_ , you're not my type," he said, pushing her away without even a glance.

"What is your type then?" she asked, annoyed.

" _Not you_ ," Michell said, grinning.

"Arsehole!" 

Mitchell paid no mind, and instead, he walked around, addressing the crowd, "You may have come here lured by the current lawless state of this territory. Maybe you think it would be easy to take out the werewolf that killed Herrick, but listen, and listen well, I will stake every single one of you before you touch him or if you even come near my home and what is mine."

To make a point, he swiftly swung a chair into the wall and picked up a pointy piece of wood and started playing idly with it.

"I heard you've been dry. What can you do against us?" someone braved.

"Seth and Herrick made the mistake of underestimating my friends and me," he said menacingly. "Ah! And I suggest you be more careful with your feedings. Herrick is not around anymore, and neither are the cover-up systems of our way of life. Clean up your act before you attract higher management's attention. And fix up this dump!" he yelled as he walked out, riled up both by the blood and the rage.

* * *

"Mitchell?" Annie asked hesitantly, unable to move when she saw Mitchell at the top of the stairs.

"It's okay Annie, I'm just... a little overwhelmed," he said, closing his eyes repeatedly trying to make them go back to their normal state. When he couldn't, he just stared away from her.

Annie swallowed unnecessarily and walked towards him until she was close enough that she could touch his bloody jaw.

"Whose blood is this, Mitchell?" Annie asked, steeling herself for the answer.

"It's not mine," he replied, shaking his head, and wiping with the back of his hand. "And I didn't draw it. I didn't kill anyone, Annie. Some vampire girl kissed me."

"Oh, did she?" Annie asked, her upper lip curling in a very transparent manner but Mitchell was too distracted by what he was still feeling to notice.

"She wasn't too happy about my rejection."

Annie wetted her thumb in her mouth and rubbed it over the stain and then wiped it with the sleeve of her cardigan.

"How are you?" she finally asked, caressing his face.

"Not well. I can still hear it, Annie, the blood in their veins. It was difficult." 

His hands were on her face, and she could see how shaky they were.

"I can't make my eyes go back, I can feel the rage and the thirst on the back of my throat. It's so powerful I can't stand the feel of my skin."

Annie caressed the side of Mitchell's face, and he let her, closing his eyes and focused on her touch.

Her name came out of his lips with a sigh, "Annie,"

"I'm here," she said, embracing him and letting his forehead fall to hers.

"I need you, Annie," Mitchell pleaded, holding the back of her head over her curls and pulling her closer to him until his words were nothing but sighs on her lips.

"Shh… I'm here." 

It was not desperate and out of control as the first time when he had been in the throes of bloodlust. Annie kissed him slowly and gently, and the initial coolness of her skin sobered him a bit.

Slowly she undressed him as she did herself.

The two times before they had been desperate and trying to consume each other as if they could make all the monsters outside disappear.

And not just the ones outside.

They tried as they might to make all the monsters _inside_ disappear as well.

They took their time. Gone were the words and gone was the self-consciousness of being nude in front of a new lover.

Mitchell felt the horrible drumming of blood give way to only lust and how his skillful hands had forgotten the well-known dance steps of the animal chasing its prey.

Annie was new territory, uncharted and mysterious.

She was a New World with its magic and its threat, with never-ending youth and savageness.

And he was the Old World, with its disenchantment and age and hopelessly thirsty for change.

But unlike the past two times, they were both equals.

After they were sated, they lay together, intertwined.

"I missed you," he said as he traced the edges of the dim light from outside over her skin.

They were facing each other; dark curls mingling on the once-white pillowcase. Mitchell's right leg nestled between hers, tickling her soft skin slightly with its dense hair.

"I've been here all along," she said, raising her eyebrows and barely letting the corners of her mouth curl a bit.

"No, like _this_ ," he said, pulling her closer to him. "Here."

"Mitchell! We can't always be here like this," Annie replied, looking away to the ceiling.

"You don't have a bed. There isn't any other place really… Unless you're feeling _adventurous_ ," Mitchell said with a smirk.

"Don't joke," she said playfully, gently slapping his cheek.

"I'm not. I need _you_ , you know?" his voice lower, almost sighing. "Today was brutal."

"What happened?"

"Total chaos. Evil. It's quite scary when you find yourself missing Herrick."

"I'm sorry."

"The smell of it… The idea of letting go … until I saw _you_ ," Mitchell confessed.

"Where?"

"There, for some reason, I could picture you… alive… Suddenly the thumping of the blood was your pulse… You looked so alive, and your cheeks were flushed. And then…"

"Then?"

He closed his eyes tightly, visibly affected.

"I pictured you drained… Cold… You were at the bottom of the stairs, but it wasn't Owen, it was me who killed you. It nearly knocked me to my knees. I hated myself for even thinking about you like that."

He braved a look at her, and instead of repulsion, her eyes looked soft, full of concern. 

"The upside is that you can't kill me. Maybe that is the point. I'm not a risk."

"You're more than that. You tie me to some humanity I thought I had already forgotten."

"How can I do that when I don't know what it is I'm doing?" she just smiled sadly. "The future used to be everything to me. I guess it's just a big cliché, but I really thought I'd get to live in that future, that someday I'd feel like I had arrived. And then it was gone. And now, the only future I have is forever, and it's overwhelming. Tell me how you deal with that. Tell me that in a hundred years it will be less scary."

"Annie," Mitchell said, shaking his head. "It can't compare. I've had more than my fair share of lifetimes. I've been living on borrowed time for so long. You barely lived. This… existence… is not fair to you."

"Maybe there is a reason for second chances. You earned your second chance. And you and George gave me mine. I have to keep reminding me that I won't make the same mistakes twice. I need to take this, whatever this is, whatever we are one day at a time. I need to learn to live in the present."

"I'm one huge mistake," he said, looking down, and Annie's non-beating heart shudder fearing what he was about to say. "But I'm not going to lie and tell you I regret you're making it."

"Mitchell, you're _not_ a mistake. You're a new chance. You're more human than you thought you know?"

"Is that so?"

"I know because you make me feel alive. Big cliché and everything. Or maybe it's the first time someone had said that quite literally." 

She was genuinely smiling now.

"You got it all wrong _kid_ , you were just too stubborn to accept you croaked. You are _death-challenged_ ," he said teasingly as he softly tickled her on the side of her belly.

"Don't tickle me! I'm only a kid because you're ancient, you old man!"

"Well, I'm the very old man you just had sex with."

"Oh, don't say that it sounds as creepy as if I had gotten together with my Nan's old boyfriend or something."

" _Sweetheart_ , I'm _too old_ for your Nan." 

She was feigning offence.

"Do you ever not pout?"

"That's just my face."

"I know, sometimes I don't know if I want to scream at you or kiss you with those lips."

They kept alternating between teasing and getting serious.

"Tell me something human," she commanded.

"Something human?"

"Yes. Tell me a human memory," Annie insisted.

"I don't remember too much," Mitchell excused himself.

Annie tried something different, "What was your mother's name?"

"Sarah."

The name came too easy to his lips, so much that it surprised him. It had been years since he had thought about her.

"Do you remember her?"

"She was pretty. I don't remember my father. I never met him. He died when I was still in my mother's belly. But I remember her; she had very long curly hair. I bet that is no big surprise."

"Mitchell," she said softly, knowing he wanted to deflect the sorrow the memory brought.

"It's okay. I never knew anything different," Mitchell finally said, acknowledging it. "We didn't have much, but my Ma made sure I wanted for nothing. She loved me, though, I know many times she searched for him in my face."

"What happened to her?"

"She died when I was 20. Some illness or sorrow. It doesn't really matter."

Mitchell stayed silent for a minute, and after a sigh, and rubbing his stubbled cheek, he added, "This is her ring." 

As he spoke, he lifted the silver chain around his neck. 

"I've worn it since she died. See after that, enrolling in the army was easy. I didn't have much more to tie me back."

"You didn't leave anyone behind?"

"Well, I did have a sweetheart. Her name started with an M." 

Unlike the way his mother's name had come to his lips, the name of the love of his first life was forever lost.

"Mary perhaps. I can't be sure."

"Was she pretty?" Annie asked, and she chastised herself for the tinge of jealousy in her voice.

"I guess I thought she was at the time. It's too far in the past."

The thought made Annie shiver. She wondered if this was what eternity had stored for her. Would she struggle to remember meaningful things in a century? Would they wonder what was George's name long after he passed?

"You won't forget what's important to you. You don't have to worry. I can see your mind work."

"But you barely remember her, and you loved her."

"I did, but only as much as what I thought love was back then. I would have married her if I had come back alive after the war. But it doesn't mean that she was _the one_ or whatever that is supposed to mean."

"So you never went back to Ireland?"

"I did, once. I wanted to see her again. She looked beautiful but sad and tired. Her belly was so round."

Annie lifted her head surprised.

"Was it ...yours?" she asked.

"I wondered at the time. I stayed a few weeks, I made sure to feed on another town because I didn't want to kill anyone she loved."

"And?"

"I stayed until the babe came. He was as blond as the sun and… he looked exactly like my best friend from childhood," he said with a sad grin.

"How did you feel?" Annie asked, settling next to him, this time resting her head between his chest and his chin.

"Relieved, I guess. And a little sad too. She married him, my friend. But only after the child came. I guess she wondered too."

She could feel his Adam's apple moving when he spoke.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked."

"No, it's nice. I tend to think that I don't remember anything. But it's human, isn't it? Being able to feel the pull of sorrow after so many years. So, now you owe me something human." He countered.

"There's not much to say. And you know quite a bit already. God only knows I never shut up."

"Tell me something insignificant, trivial. Those are the things that define us more, the silly little details," Mitchell explained.

"My dad took me to a market once, when I was little, 3 or 4 probably. I really don't know how much it's my memory of the event or my memory of what my parents used to tell me about it, but we went together, and I remember the colours and the smells. He was picking out fruit, and he told me to hold on to his trousers, he hooked my finger to his pocket, and I remember looking at all those colours, and they were mesmerizing, and I let go."

Mitchell was holding her tighter and pulling her until she was half resting on him.

"He didn't notice. I walked around, looking at everything. I didn't notice I was alone until later; it could have been a few minutes or more. I didn't have a concept of time. But I remember the fear I had when I couldn't see my dad anywhere. He was terrified, I'm sure. When he found me, his eyes were swollen, and he was so scared. He hugged me, and I can still remember the smell of his cologne, his tanned neck, and a bit of sweat… I still remember my daddy's smell…" Her eyes were glazed over with tears, and he was gently rocking her.

"So I guess we're both more human than we thought right?" he asked, running his fingers through her hair.

"Speaking of humanity. You probably need to go to sleep now," Annie said, feeling calmer.

"Are you going to try? Have you slept anymore since that nap you took a few days ago?" Mitchell inquired.

"I tried once, but I just got to the dozing off part and then… I felt like I was falling. I haven't let myself since then. I'm scared to try."

"Then I won't," he said with resolve.

"But it's late."

"It's not too long until I have to go get George. You want to come with?" 

When he asked he tilted her head up with a finger.

"No… That's your time together. I'll make sure to have breakfast ready for you."

"You don't have to," he replied.

"I know. I want to. And that is _my_ thing with George and you," she said smiling.

"Very well, then. So… What are you going to do to keep me up in the meantime?" 

Mitchell immediately noticed his choice of words and quickly corrected himself, " _Awake_! I mean awake! Oh, Christ. You're contagious!" he said, laughing.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading.


End file.
